Arctic Wolf CEO Nick Schneider joins the Twin Cities Business Show to talk about how artificial intelligence has fundamentally changed cybersecurity. According to Schneider, we are already past the point where humans can defend against agents, and need agents of their own to keep themselves safe.

Schneider explains how AI is giving cybercriminals new capabilities, why the window to respond to vulnerabilities has gone from months to what he calls “negative time,” and why the future of cybersecurity will require machines defending against machines.

Four key quotes from our interview:

“Humans really aren’t able to defend against sophisticated machines, and machines are needed to defend against machines.”

“Cybersecurity has become a critical component of any business’s core strategy.” “

If you don’t know what to do with all the telemetry or the alerts or what those tools are telling you, you’re no better off than when you didn’t have those tools.”

“You can for the first time solve the whole problem that cybersecurity has historically set out to solve in one elegant delivery.”

We also talk about Arctic Wolf’s agentic security operations platform, how AI agents work alongside humans, the company’s growth to roughly 12,000 customers, and whether Arctic Wolf is headed for an IPO (hint: it sounds like it). Schneider shares that the company is at the scale and has the product-market fit to be publicly traded, and he describes the decision as “when, not if.”

We also discuss Schneider’s career at Compellent and Code42, why he joined Arctic Wolf, what makes Minnesota a strong — but imperfect — place to build technology companies, and his recent decision to join the board of Yardstik.

Chapters:

• 00:00 Intro: Arctic Wolf CEO Nick Schneider
• 00:25 How AI is changing cybersecurity
• 02:28 When ChatGPT changed the threat landscape
• 03:50 Cyberattacks are happening at “negative time”
• 05:04 What mid-sized companies need to do now
• 07:00 Why humans can’t defend against machines alone
• 10:27 How Arctic Wolf’s AI agents work
• 12:13 When AI agents bring humans into the loop
• 13:32 Can AI solve cybersecurity’s biggest problems?
• 15:00 Where Arctic Wolf stands in 2026
• 16:44 Is Arctic Wolf preparing for an IPO?
• 18:42 “When, not if”
• 20:00 What changes when you become a public-company CEO
• 24:59 The importance of mentors and leadership teams
• 27:47 How Schneider builds an executive team
• 30:31 From Compellent and Code42 to Arctic Wolf
• 34:59 The story of how Schneider joined Arctic Wolf
• 37:39 Why Minnesota is a strong place to build tech companies
• 40:31 Why Schneider joined the Yardstik board
• 47:10 Where Arctic Wolf could be in 10 years
• 48:32 The future of cybersecurity: humans + AI
• 49:05 Final thoughts