Multicloud networking vendor Aviatrix dipped its toes into cloud security waters today and launched ThreatIQ with ThreatGuard.

The security functionality is baked into the Aviatrix cloud networking platform — a cloud-native abstraction layer between virtual private clouds running in any of the major public cloud provider’s networks and on premises. The new security service announced today embeds threat inspection and policy-based enforcement into those nodes.

“We’ve spent the last several years on the networking aspects of multicloud,” Brian Ashley, VP of product marketing at Aviatrix, told SDxCentral. “What we’re starting to see now is enterprise organizations really starting to struggle with security in the cloud.”

By inspecting traffic in real time as it crosses the network, the company claims the service can detect threats that might otherwise go unchecked by traditional security appliances like firewalls.

With the shift to the cloud, security perimeters have fundamentally changed. Whereas on premise, access to the internet could be physically controlled, in the cloud it’s just a single hop away from any workload, Ashley explained.

And while firewalls or emerging technologies like secure access service edge (SASE) are powerful tools for mitigating these threats, they can only address what that they can see, he added. “We still run the risk of new workloads being spun up, shadow IT coming in, making a change, and then all of a sudden you’re opening something up to the internet, and now your business risk goes through the roof.”

That’s not to say Aviatrix is trying to displace firewalls or SASE. “We’re not telling you to get rid of your next-generation firewall or kick Zscaler out,” he said.

Instead, Aviatrix sees an opportunity to take advantage of its position as a network overlay to patch the holes. “Aviatrix is uniquely positioned to do this differently because we own the data plane,” Ashley said. “We see all of the traffic.”

ThreatIQ with ThreatGuard takes advantage of this visibility and uses threat feeds to identify traffic originating from or bound for a known threat. Meanwhile, policy-based security enforcement tools provide a degree of automated threat remediation.

“What that’s really starting to do is augment a lot of the existing security solutions to fill in some of those gaps,” Ashley said.

ThreatIQ with ThreatGuard is available today from Aviatrix, its channel partners, and is on all major public cloud marketplaces.

Founded in 2014, Aviatrix's strategy of eliminating networking barriers to cloud adoption has helped the startup raise $340 million across five funding rounds. The latest garnered $200 million earlier this year and drove the company into the double unicorn territory with a valuation north of $2 billion.

In an interview at the time, CEO Steve Mullaney said the company was on track to pursue an initial public offering within two years.

Until then, the company is looking to grow and is investing heavily to expand its sales team, add channel partners, engineers, and develop new products. Mullaney expects to double his staff to more than 500 by next fall.

“We’re dramatically hiring sales teams,” Mullaney told SDxCentral in September. “We’re going to spend more marketing, we’re going to add way more engineers. Because this is the next 30 to 40 years: We’re going to keep innovating and coming out with more and more functionality.”