Circumvent raises $6M to tackle cloud security alert fatigue with AI-driven remediation

Cloud security startup Circumvent has raised $6 million in seed funding from Paladin Capital Group to help teams cut through alert overload and fix risks faster. The fresh capital infusion will go toward product development, early customer engagement, and setting up a commercial HQ in San Francisco, while R&D stays rooted in Australia.

The platform uses AI to filter, correlate, and prioritize alerts from across a company’s infrastructure—cloud-native tools, open-source, and third-party systems alike. It ties those signals to business context and guides teams with source-level remediation, helping them focus on what needs fixing.

Circumvent was founded by Michael Watts and his long-time friend Thomas Bui. Watts previously started Cloud Conformity, which was acquired by Trend Micro in a $100 million deal. Bui, now CTO, has held roles in banking, government, and Uber. Together, they’ve built a track record of delivering practical tools that solve real security problems.

The startup is taking on one of the most frustrating issues in cloud security: alert fatigue. Instead of forcing teams to manually triage endless alerts, the company’s Multi-Agent AI System learns the customer’s environment and automatically handles prioritization and remediation. These virtual agents are built to plug into DevSecOps workflows and operate like security specialists, minus the burnout.

“We’re not just generating more alerts—we’re building the intelligence layer that helps teams understand what to fix, why it’s important, and how to take immediate action to resolve the root cause,” said Watts.

Bui adds, “By aligning alerts with real-time business context, Circumvent ruthlessly prioritises risks, identifies root causes, and enables engineering teams to take precise, targeted remediation actions at the source.”

The company is already working with major enterprises across the U.S., Australia, and New Zealand—including large AWS, Azure, and Google Cloud customers.

“We’re thrilled to be working again with Michael Watts and the exceptional founding team at Circumvent,” said Tom Clute, Principal at Paladin Capital Group. “Circumvent is addressing one of the most critical challenges in cloud security today: closing the gap between identifying risks and driving effective, scalable remediation.”

Circumvent wants to make it easier for cloud teams to act fast without sacrificing safety, turning alerts into action, without the noise.