Clearly AI

What do they actually do

Clearly AI builds software to automate security and privacy reviews for product changes, internal systems, and third‑party vendors. The product guides teams through structured intake and analysis and turns the inputs into consistent outputs like PIAs/DPIAs, design review summaries, data‑flow maps, and audit‑ready evidence (homepage, products, blog).

It is built for security, privacy, and GRC teams that need to reduce manual review backlogs, standardize documentation, and unblock releases without pulling engineers off roadmap work. It supports both in‑house reviews and vendor/third‑party assessments and is positioned to shorten audit prep with regulator‑ready outputs (solutions for GRC teams, YC profile).

Who are their target customer(s)

• Security teams at mid‑to‑large tech companies: Manual security reviews and threat modeling create backlogs and pull engineers into paperwork instead of product work, slowing releases.
• Privacy and compliance teams in regulated industries: They must deliver PIAs/DPIAs and regulator‑ready documentation for every feature; the work is repetitive, slow, and difficult to scale consistently.
• GRC (governance, risk, and compliance) teams: Preparing evidence, maintaining controls across frameworks, and producing audit‑ready reports are manual and time‑consuming, making audits painful and visibility poor.
• Product and engineering leads shipping features: Launches stall due to design reviews, data‑flow mapping, and security/privacy intake requests that interrupt roadmap execution.
• Vendor/third‑party risk managers: They run repeated, manual vendor assessments across many suppliers, which doesn’t scale and leaves blind spots in third‑party risk.

How would they acquire their first 10, 50, and 100 customers

• First 10: Convert the founders’ existing relationships into 4–8 week pilots that replace one manual review cycle and produce audit‑ready outputs, capturing time‑savings and a short case study as proof.
• First 50: Repeat the pilot playbook via targeted outbound and partners: host webinars/workshops, use early case studies in outreach to mid‑size tech and regulated firms, and co‑sell with boutique consultancies using a standardized 1–2 week fast‑start pilot.
• First 100: Add repeatable enterprise sales and product‑led motion: hire AEs for account‑based outreach, offer a self‑serve trial for smaller teams, publish integrations/marketplace listings, and scale channel partnerships to speed procurement and expand pipeline.

What is the rough total addressable market

Top-down context:

Published markets that cover Clearly AI’s use cases include eGRC (~$62.9B, 2024) (Grand View Research), privacy management software (~$4.4B, 2023) (GMI Insights), vendor/third‑party risk (~$10–11B, 2024) (Grand View Research), security automation (~$8–11B, 2024) (Grand View Research), and DPIA/PIA automation (~$1.3B, 2024) (DataIntelo). Because these categories overlap, a practical TAM band for Clearly AI is roughly $60B–$90B today rather than a simple sum.

Bottom-up calculation:

Assuming 45k–65k mid‑to‑large organizations with formal security/privacy/GRC programs and average combined annual spend of ~$1.1M–$1.6M on GRC, privacy, vendor‑risk, and security‑automation tools—70%–90% of which touches review, assessment, and audit‑evidence workflows—yields an addressable range of roughly $60B–$90B.

Assumptions:

• There are ~45k–65k global mid‑to‑large organizations with dedicated security/privacy/GRC programs.
• Average combined annual tool budgets across GRC, privacy, vendor‑risk, and security‑automation are ~$1.1M–$1.6M per organization.
• Roughly 70%–90% of that tooling spend directly supports reviews, assessments, data mapping, and audit‑evidence workflows.

Who are some of their notable competitors

• OneTrust: Broad privacy and GRC platform with DPIA/PIA workflows, data mapping, and vendor risk modules; a heavyweight incumbent in privacy assessments and compliance.
• Vanta: Automated compliance platform focused on continuous evidence collection and controls monitoring (SOC 2, ISO 27001, etc.), reducing audit prep time.
• Drata: Compliance automation for frameworks like SOC 2/ISO; strong integrations and automated evidence to streamline audits and reporting.
• Whistic: Vendor security assessment platform that automates questionnaires and provides a vendor security network/catalog to speed third‑party reviews.
• Securiti: Privacy and data governance suite with DPIA automation, data mapping, and AI governance; overlaps with privacy assessments central to Clearly AI’s use cases.