The cybersecurity startup Snyk, once valued at $8.5 billion, has seen the value of its employee stock grants shrink to a fraction of their peak, a slide that mirrors a broader repricing of software companies in the age of generative AI.
The numbers tell the story
At the height of the 2021 boom Snyk raised capital at an $8.5 billion valuation, followed by a $7.4 billion round in 2022. Former employees recall share prices above $10 during that window. By summer 2025 the internal valuation had fallen to roughly $3, and an internal document viewed by Business Insider puts the late-August 2026 price at $1.16. Snyk declined to comment on employee share valuations or to provide a current company valuation, saying only that 2026 has brought "accelerating momentum" and three new product launches.
A sector-wide reset
Dan Morgan, a senior trust portfolio manager at Synovus Trust, said the drop is "definitely a trend, not an exception" for software-as-a-service companies facing powerful new AI systems. Airtable, valued at more than $11 billion in 2021, agreed to a $1.3 billion sale earlier this month. Domo, once worth $2.8 billion, now carries a market capitalization below $200 million. Snyk is also contending with AI labs such as Anthropic, Coinbase has said it used Claude to scan its codebase, and with Wiz, which Google acquired in March.
Leadership turnover and financials
Peter McKay stepped down as chief executive in February after roughly seven years, saying the company needed a leader with "deep roots in product innovation and AI." He now serves as a value accelerator advisor at Goldman Sachs and remains an advisor to Snyk. Chief financial officer Kenneth MacAskill took over as interim chief executive. The company has cut jobs in at least two rounds since 2025 and in June described a "flattening leadership" effort to move faster. UK government records show Snyk lost $188 million on $278 million of revenue for the year ended December 2024; McKay had told TechCrunch that month the business was "very close to break-even" and eyeing an eventual public offering.
What to watch
The gap between Snyk's last private markup and its employee-share price is now wide enough to matter for hiring and retention. With an interim chief executive, a competitive landscape reshaped by AI-native tooling, and a profit target still unmet, the next funding round, or an IPO filing, will be the first external test of whether the claimed momentum translates into a valuation that resembles the old one.