CISO Tribune

Vendor comparison · 2 companies

Escape vs Upwind

Escape sells an offensive security platform that uses AI agents to discover, test and remediate vulnerabilities in engineering workflows. Upwind sells security for cloud workloads, APIs and agents, combining their context with runtime intelligence to identify critical risks and catch new attacks in real time. CISO Tribune files both under API security. This page sets the two records side by side: what each sells, where it is based, who owns and funds it, the customers it names and its recent news, each fact numbered to its source.

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  • Escape
  • Upwind
Escape vs Upwind: Products, Customers and Funding Compared
EscapeEscape sells an offensive security platform that uses AI agents to discover, test and remediate vulnerabilities in engineering workflows.escape.techUpwindUpwind sells security for cloud workloads, APIs and agents, combining their context with runtime intelligence to identify critical risks and catch new attacks in real time.upwind.io
What it sells
  • AI Pentesting[2][4][5][10]Continuous AI-powered pentesting that learns the customer's business and proves exploitability.
  • Cloud Security[1]A CNAPP that combines posture, workload and runtime signals to find and prioritize cloud risks.
  • AI Security[8]Monitors AI workloads and agents within the cloud environment to identify risky configurations and behaviour.
  • Agentic Security[1][7]Watches autonomous AI agents and their skills or MCP connections for malicious or high-risk activity.
  • Cloud Security Posture Management (CSPM)[1]Checks cloud account and resource configuration against security policy on an ongoing basis.
  • Cloud Infrastructure Entitlements Management (CIEM)[1]Analyses identity permissions across cloud platforms to reduce excess access.
  • Cloud Detection & Response (CDR)[1]Correlates runtime signals and cloud activity logs to detect and respond to threats as they occur.
Categories
Headquarters
Biarritz, France[3]Not stated on its pages
Founded
2020[1]2022[2][4]
Ownership and funding
Privately held[4][9][11][12]Privately held[4][11]
Named customers
Not stated on its pagesNot stated on its pages
Recent news
  • March 10, 2026Escape announced an $18 million Series A round led by Balderton Capital, with Uncorrelated Ventures, IRIS and Y Combinator also participating.[8]
Not stated on its pages
G2 and Gartner Peer Insights
  • G2: listed, seen November 3, 2026[9]
  • Gartner Peer Insights: Not stated on its pages
  • G2: listed, seen November 10, 2026[11]
  • Gartner Peer Insights: Not stated on its pages
Who it fits
From its own pages, Escape sells mainly to security teams that want to replace legacy scanners and manual offensive security processes. Escape says its platform can replace manual pentest and bug bounty programs, and legacy DAST. Escape describes cloud and on-prem hybrid deployments so that internal applications can be assessed without giving external consultants or bug hunters access. Its compliance support names frameworks such as PCI-DSS, HIPAA, CRA, SOC 2 and ISO 27001.Upwind's API offering is aimed at organizations that run APIs in the cloud. Upwind's AI security offering is aimed at organizations that run AI applications on cloud infrastructure. Upwind's code security features address teams practising shift-left security in AI-native development.
Last verified
September 27, 2026November 5, 2026

Where they overlap

  • Escape and Upwind are both filed under API security.
  • Both are privately held.

Where they differ, field by field

  • Escape's primary category is API security; Upwind's is Cloud-native application protection (CNAPP).
  • Escape is also filed under Dynamic application security testing and External attack surface management. Upwind is also filed under Cloud security posture management and Cloud detection and response.
  • Escape lists AI Pentesting. Upwind lists Cloud Security, AI Security, Agentic Security, Cloud Security Posture Management (CSPM), Cloud Infrastructure Entitlements Management (CIEM) and 1 more.
  • Escape is headquartered in Biarritz, France.
  • Escape was founded in 2020. Upwind was founded in 2022.

What it sells: Escape

What AI Pentesting does[2][4][5][10]
AI Pentesting delivers reports that auditors and engineers can act on. White-box pentesting is available, so it can run with the customer's source code. Escape converts previous AI pentesting findings into automated regression tests that run on every build with DAST.

Questions about Escape and Upwind

What do Escape and Upwind sell?
Escape sells AI Pentesting. Upwind sells Cloud Security, AI Security, Agentic Security, Cloud Security Posture Management (CSPM), Cloud Infrastructure Entitlements Management (CIEM) and 1 more.
Are Escape and Upwind in the same category?
They share API security. Escape's primary category is API security and Upwind's is Cloud-native application protection (CNAPP).
Where are Escape and Upwind headquartered?
Escape is headquartered in Biarritz, France.
When were Escape and Upwind founded?
Escape was founded in 2020. Upwind was founded in 2022.
Who owns Escape and Upwind?
Escape is privately held. Upwind is privately held.
Who are Escape and Upwind sold to?
From its own pages, Escape sells mainly to security teams that want to replace legacy scanners and manual offensive security processes. Upwind's API offering is aimed at organizations that run APIs in the cloud.
What have Escape and Upwind announced recently?
March 10, 2026: Escape announced an $18 million Series A round led by Balderton Capital, with Uncorrelated Ventures, IRIS and Y Combinator also participating.

About Escape

Escape sells an offensive security platform that uses AI agents to discover, test and remediate vulnerabilities in engineering workflows. Escape says the platform replaces legacy scanners and manual offensive security processes.

Escape says it rebuilds offensive and application security from the ground up, covering business logic testing, agentic pentesting and code-to-cloud correlation. Escape states that all of this is always developed in-house.

Escape's AI Pentesting is continuous AI-powered pentesting that learns the customer's business, proves exploitability, and delivers reports that auditors and engineers can act on. White-box pentesting is available, so Escape's AI Pentesting can run with the customer's source code. Escape also converts previous AI pentesting findings into automated regression tests that run on every build with DAST.[5]

Escape's DAST is described as in-house and AI-powered, and it secures applications at the business logic level. Escape's testing covers workflows, access control and multi-step processes, not just payloads.

Escape's external network pentesting is continuous testing of everything reachable from the internet. Every host, port and exposed service is probed the way an attacker would, with proof of what is exploitable, followed by a retest. Escape's attack surface management discovers and validates exposure of modern applications, APIs and infrastructure from code to cloud. Escape discovers APIs and SPAs, not just DNS and ports, both internal and external.

Escape's documentation says its platform section applies across all Escape products: ASM, DAST and AI Pentesting. Customers can deploy a Private Location in their own network to discover and test internal applications. Private Locations enable scanning of applications that are not accessible from the public internet.[10]

On integrations, Escape sends assets directly to Wiz. Escape offers a public API, a CLI and an MCP Server, and says security gates run in CI/CD when scans are triggered on every push. Escape also has native integrations with AI-assisted IDEs such as Cursor, Claude Code and Gemini for remediation.

For compliance, Escape says PCI-DSS, HIPAA, CRA, SOC 2, ISO 27001 and 20+ other frameworks are natively supported. Escape maintains SOC 2 Type II certification. Escape uses proprietary AI models on AWS infrastructure, Microsoft Azure LLM Deployments and Cloudflare Workers AI Models.[2][5][6][7][13]

Escape on the record

Sources

Escape full record

  1. [1]Seed fundraising api securityEscape · escape.tech · published June 6, 2023 · Tier A
  2. [2]escape.techEscape · escape.tech · undated page, accessed September 27, 2026 · Tier A
  3. [3]TermsEscape · escape.tech · undated page, accessed September 27, 2026 · Tier A
  4. [4]Escape: AI-Powered Offensive Security PlatformEscape · undated page, accessed October 24, 2026 · Tier A
  5. [5]Continuous AI Pentesting Actionable for Engineers - EscapeEscape · undated page, accessed October 24, 2026 · Tier A
  6. [6]Escape Attack Surface ManagementEscape · undated page, accessed October 24, 2026 · Tier A
  7. [7]Escape - AI-powered DASTEscape · undated page, accessed October 24, 2026 · Tier A
  8. [8]Escape raises $18M Series A to replace legacy scanners with AI agent-driven discovery, pentesting, and remediationEscape · published March 10, 2026 · Tier A
  9. [9]Escape Reviews 2026: Details, Pricing, & Features - G2G2 · undated page, accessed October 24, 2026 · Tier C
  10. [10]Platform - Escape DocumentationEscape · undated page, accessed November 3, 2026 · Tier A
  11. [11]Private Locations - Escape DocumentationEscape · undated page, accessed November 3, 2026 · Tier A
  12. [12]Internal Network Scanning - Escape DocumentationEscape · undated page, accessed November 3, 2026 · Tier A
  13. [13]Privacy & Security - Escape DocumentationEscape · undated page, accessed November 3, 2026 · Tier A

Upwind full record

  1. [1]upwind.ioUpwind · upwind.io · undated page, accessed November 5, 2026 · Tier A
  2. [2]NewsroomUpwind · upwind.io · undated page, accessed November 5, 2026 · Tier A
  3. [3]Upwind Security: Cloud & AI Security for the Realtime EraUpwind · undated page, accessed November 10, 2026 · Tier A
  4. [4]About - UpwindUpwind · undated page, accessed November 10, 2026 · Tier A
  5. [5]Upwind Case Studies: Real-World Cloud Security Success StoriesUpwind · undated page, accessed November 10, 2026 · Tier A
  6. [6]Run - UpwindUpwind · undated page, accessed November 10, 2026 · Tier A
  7. [7]Agentic Security - UpwindUpwind · undated page, accessed November 10, 2026 · Tier A
  8. [8]AI Security Platform - UpwindUpwind · undated page, accessed November 10, 2026 · Tier A
  9. [9]Runtime API Security: Discover and Protect APIs in Real TimeUpwind · undated page, accessed November 10, 2026 · Tier A
  10. [10]Build - UpwindUpwind · undated page, accessed November 10, 2026 · Tier A
  11. [11]Upwind Reviews 2026: Details, Pricing, & FeaturesG2 · undated page, accessed November 10, 2026 · Tier C

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