From Ballet To Breach Prevention: How A Magician’s Son Raised $4.2M In Seed Funding For His Cybersecurity Startup

What happened

Editor’s note: The following is the latest profile in a series of articles about startup founders from non-technical backgrounds who have launched successful venture-backed companies. Read the previous interviews in the series including with MagicSchool AI founder Adeel Khan here , Trunk Tools founder Sarah Buchner here , Tabs founder Ali Hussain here , Craft founder Ilya Levtov here , GC AI founder Cecilia Ziniti here , and Incredible Health co-founder Iman Abuzeid here .

Before William “Will” Cielen was building cybersecurity software, he was performing in his father’s magic shows. The son of a magician and an acrobat, Cielen spent his first five years living on a cruise ship, followed by five years in Las Vegas.

At 10, he moved to Montreal, where he entered an intensive ballet program, spending mornings dancing and afternoons in school. Zin Bitar, William Cielen and Alexandre Genest, co-founders of Hilt.