Editor’s note: Louis will lead an editorial roundtable on this topic at VB Transform this month. Register today.

Open-source AI is shaping the future of cybersecurity innovation, consistently breaking down barriers and delivering results. Its impact spans from agile startups to Cisco‘s Foundation-Sec-8B model, which was downloaded over 18,000 times in just the last month and over 40,000 times since launch.

VentureBeat is seeing the trend accelerating, especially in cybersecurity startups that are bringing a new level of intensity to turning roadmaps into revenue-producing products. Based on months of interviews with startup founders, open-source AI is now indispensable to them and their teams when it comes to fast-tracking concepts to completed, shippable code.

Databricks’ recently announced partnership with Noma Security demonstrates how startups leveraging open-source AI are rapidly disrupting legacy cybersecurity providers by achieving accelerated time-to-market and substantial operational maturity. Cisco’s President and Chief Product Officer Jeetu Patel spoke to the critical shift at RSAC 2025, “AI is fundamentally changing everything, and cybersecurity is at the heart of it all. We’re no longer dealing with human...