Ryft raises $8M with support from Wiz founders to help enterprises take charge of cloud data
The Israeli startup aims to break enterprise dependence on major cloud providers like Snowflake and Databricks.
A new player in the data infrastructure market, Ryft, has come out of stealth with $8 million in Seed funding. The startup says it wants to help businesses manage their data more easily, and on their own terms, instead of staying tied to large cloud providers.
Full list of Israeli high-tech funding rounds in 2025
The Seed round was led by Index Ventures and joined by Bessemer Venture Partners. It also drew backing from members of Wiz’s founding team, along with senior figures from Zscaler, Crowdstrike, Confluent, and Cisco.
Founded last year by Yossi Reitblat, Yuval Yogev, and Guy Gadon, all of whom served in Israel’s intelligence community, Ryft is building its platform around Apache Iceberg, an open-source framework for modern data lakes. The idea is to give companies the convenience of a managed service, covering tasks like compliance, security, and optimization, without forcing them to hand over control of their data to a single vendor.
For many companies, shifting huge volumes of data to the cloud has unlocked new opportunities but also introduced headaches. Providers such as Snowflake, Databricks, Microsoft, and Google have made it easier to store and analyze information at scale, yet some customers now find themselves facing high bills, rigid systems, and barriers when trying to move data elsewhere.
Related articles:
Ryft argues its model strikes a better balance by adding a managed layer on top of Iceberg, aiming to give companies tighter control while handling the day-to-day complexity behind the scenes.
“Companies want to move faster and build the right foundation for AI, but they can’t afford to get bogged down in complicated infrastructure,” said Reitblat, who serves as CEO. “If they do, they risk falling behind.”
Ryft says it already has customers across industries such as finance, e-commerce, adtech, gaming, and cybersecurity. With the new funding, the team plans to grow its engineering group, broaden its partner network, and ramp up commercial efforts.
