.png){kind=logo}
Software development is today advancing at an incredible pace. Businesses are demanding faster release cycles, customers expect seamless digital experiences, and engineering teams face constant pressure to deliver. However, security often falls behind; it is viewed as a last-minute checkpoint rather than an essential principle woven into the development process.
In a recent episode of the Analytics Insight Podcast, host Priya Dialani spoke with Vijender Katiyar, Co-Founder and Chief Revenue Officer, CleanStart, about why this mindset must change. “Security doesn’t fail because teams move fast,” Vijender said. “It fails when security is bolted on instead of built in.”
Today’s applications are rarely written entirely in-house. Nearly 80–90% of software components come from open-source repositories, accelerating development while quietly expanding the attack surface. CleanStart CRO argues that trust in software begins with visibility. “If you don’t know where your software comes from, how it was built, or whether it’s been compromised, you shouldn’t be using it,” he said.
This lack of transparency has fueled a rise in software supply chain attacks, where attackers poison widely used packages rather than targeting individual organizations. “One compromised component can impact thousands of companies at once,” CleanStart co-founder noted. “That’s the scale of risk we’re dealing with today.”
Traditional security models, focused on audits, reviews, and post-release fixes, no longer work in cloud-native environments. According to Vijender, security must be embedded directly into development workflows. “Secure-by-design means starting with trusted base images and clean dependencies,” he explained. “You can’t fix trust at the end of the pipeline.”
As enterprises increasingly adopt AI models and open-source LLMs, the challenge grows more complex. CleanStart uses AI-driven workflows to validate software components before they reach production. “The question shouldn’t be ‘Is this vulnerable?’,” Vijender said. “It should be ‘Can this be trusted at all?’”
With regulators demanding evidence through tools like Software Bills of Materials (SBOMs), security is becoming measurable and auditable. Done right, CleanStart co-founder believes, it stops being a blocker. “When trust is built in from day zero,” he said, “security becomes a business enabler, not a bottleneck.”
