Ex-Secret Service Agent Stephen Ward Launches $250 Million Cybersecurity Fund II

Stephen Ward, a former Secret Service operative who once recruited a notorious hacker as an informant, is seeking to close a second $250 million venture fund focused on cybersecurity. The effort follows the successful launch of Brightmind Partners’ debut fund in 2024, which closed at the same size and already delivered a $740 million exit through the sale of identity-security startup SGNL to CrowdStrike.

Ward’s pragmatic view of exits, “you have to sell on the way up”, sets him apart in a venture community that often touts IPOs as the default outcome. The approach proved effective when Brightmind led SGNL’s Series A round, and less than a year later CrowdStrike agreed to acquire the company for $740 million. That transaction remains the sole exit from the first fund, which has made 14 investments to date.

The new fund will be raised solely by Ward, who now serves as Brightmind’s only general partner after co-founder Gur Talpaz and early teammate Tayler Sipperly departed in April to start a separate firm, Cognition. Cognition, backed by CrowdStrike’s former global CTO Elia Zaitsev, is targeting a $170 million first fund but continues to support Brightmind’s existing portfolio companies and limited partners.

Ward’s path to venture capital is unconventional. Raised on two farms in northwest New Jersey, he joined the Coast Guard after high school, serving four years in search and rescue before earning a criminal-justice degree at Seton Hall. A professor’s connection led to a Secret Service interview, and Ward spent nine years with the agency, focusing on financial-crime investigations and later cyber work after 9/11. While stationed in New York, he arrested a hacker responsible for the era’s largest credit-card data breach, then turned the individual into an informant for three years. The informant later resumed illegal activity, prompting a diversionary accusation that temporarily implicated Ward. He ultimately cleared his name after an 18-month investigation, and the episode was later dramatized in Audible’s eight-episode podcast “Operation Firewall.”

After leaving the Secret Service, Ward entered the private sector, first building a cybersecurity unit at J.P. Morgan in 2007, then serving as CISO at TIAA for six years and Home Depot for two. In 2021 he quit the corporate world, briefly considered a role at Wiz, and instead joined Insight Partners after a recommendation from Insight’s Jeff Horing. At Insight, Ward helped oversee investments in Wiz, Abnormal Security and Elisity, the latter later agreed to be acquired by IonQ for up to $1.3 billion.

Now, at 49, Ward is betting on his own judgment to raise capital from a limited pool of investors, fewer than 20 limited partners committed to the first fund, including Horing. The timing aligns with a rare market shift: early-stage cyber firms are attracting more financing than later-stage companies for the first time in over a decade. Ward believes this environment will enable more frequent “sell-on-the-way-up” outcomes.

Looking ahead, Ward’s ability to secure the second $250 million will hinge on his track record, the continued appetite for early-stage cyber investments, and the performance of Brightmind’s existing portfolio. If successful, the fund could reinforce a growing trend of smaller, founder-led venture firms challenging traditional, later-stage cyber investors, while offering founders a partner whose experience spans government, corporate security and venture capital.