Ukrainian non-profit educational institution SET University together with American startup Hilltop Technologies have launched a new cybersecurity startup in Ukraine — SET Cyber Labs. During the IT Arena in Lviv, AIN had an opportunity to talk to its co-founder Nick Gicinto to better understand what the startup does and why it is important.

Collaboration between SET University and Hilltop Technologies

  • In simple terms, SET Cyber Labs acts as the research and development arm of Hilltop Technologies, an American company focusing on building cybersecurity tools. The startup’s goal is to offer affordable cybersecurity solutions to Ukrainian companies and institutions that lack the resources for high-end industry solutions. 

  • The project came to be after Nick Gicinto, a former CIA agent and cybersecurity specialist at Uber, Tesla, gave a lecture at SET University. Nick also founded Hilltop Technologies, which offers cybersecurity solutions for small and medium-sized businesses. This expertise led to deeper ties with SET University and resulted in the creation of SET Cyber Labs.

  • Nick Gicinto stated that one of SET Cyber Labs additional goals is to provide Ukrainian students with practical experience through internships, where they work on real-world cybersecurity challenges under the guidance of experienced professionals from leading tech companies.

“The lessons learned here by Ukrainian cyber practitioners are extremely valuable to the rest of the world, because we can replicate the experience of dealing with Russian cyber threat actors worldwide. And I think the Ukrainian cyber community's ability to manage that adversary is a testament to the level of expertise, ingenuity, creativity, resiliency that the rest of the world can benefit from in its cyber practices,” Nick Gicinto told our editor.

 

SET Cyber Labs has already opened its office in Kyiv and is preparing to join Diia.City, a unique legal and tax space for IT companies in Ukraine.

Further plans

SET Cyber Labs’ primary focus is the development of a SaaS cybersecurity platform called Volt. The platform offers a wide range of services, including constant threat monitoring and response, endpoint protection and detection, advanced cloud and network security, as well as AI-based phishing attack analysis.

While talking about monetization, Nick discussed the challenge of offering cybersecurity to smaller entities that can’t afford expensive industry solutions. SET Cyber Labs aims to provide top-tier protection at a fraction of the cost, focusing on organizations such as educational institutions, nonprofits, and small businesses that typically don’t have the budget for cybersecurity. By offering more value at a lower cost, they create a viable solution for these entities.

“Hilltop Technologies has been the full service cyber partner for William Jewell College now for six months without any successful cyber attacks against its network. We've proven the concept and know that our solution works and we know that it provides value. So the next step is to replicate that for other institutions and other entities so that we can begin to build a much bigger shield around these institutions and make them much harder targets for cyber threat actors,” Nick shared.

 

The further plans include continuing to grow SET Cyber Labs’ research and development capabilities in Ukraine, leveraging local talent to build cybersecurity solutions.