About us

Founded on August 10, 2021, avantguard cyber security offers technical security audits such as penetration tests, red teaming, and client audits. Thanks to our specialization and numerous certifications in this field, we are able to provide our services with the highest quality and have been privileged to count reputable companies among our clients since our inception. All services are carried out by our certified experts either at our location in Rapperswil SG or on-site at our clients' premises. We stand for proactive security in line with our motto: STRIKE BEFORE HACKERS.

Pascal Sommer

CEO & Founder

BSc ETH CS, OSEP, OSCP, CRTL, CRTO, CRTP, CARTP, CRTS, OPST, CAPE

Pascal leads the execution of attack simulations and red teaming activities of all kinds to assess the situation and proactively improve the security of our customers. He places particular emphasis on protection against realistic threats and practicable security, supported by his sound and in-depth knowledge of attack techniques. Additionally, he leads the further development of software solutions for our clients.

Jann Lemm

CTO & Founder

BSc FH ST, OSCP, CRTP, CARTP, OPST

Jann supports our customers through every step of their cybersecurity transformation. This includes prioritizing and planning projects, scoping and executing them. Through his work on mandates over several years, he has also gained valuable knowledge of customer-internal tracking and reporting of results. In addition to project work, he continues to further enhance our payloads and tools and leads the research.

Lorella Sommer

Teamleader Office Management & Project Coordination

Commercial Employee EFZ, Leadership SVF

Lorella completed her apprenticeship as a Commercial Employee EFZ (Federal Diploma of Vocational Education and Training) in a leading Swiss manufacturing and trading company. She then worked for several years as a back office manager for a leading cyber security service provider in Switzerland. Based on her performance, she was promoted to Deputy Team Leader Backoffice and was entrusted with the management of the backoffice for over a year. As part of this promotion, Lorella successfully completed the Leadership SVF course and is certified accordingly.

Specialties: Resource Management, Planning

Rinaldo Erens

Penetration Tester

System Engineer EFZ, OSCP

As a penetration tester, Rinaldo explores our customers' systems and checks them for vulnerabilities. Driven by curiosity, he gets involved with the individual target system. He is convinced that complexity increases the attack surface. In his seek after knowledge, he is able to uncover risks and thus reduce the existing attack surface. He also has over 10 years of experience as a technical consultant.

Andrei Herasimau

Penetration Tester

MSc ETH CS, OSCP, CRTL, CRTO

András Tarlós

Software Engineer

Sandro Ackermann

Penetration Tester

CAS Cyber Security, HF Informatik, OSCP, CRTL, CRTO

Michael Russo

Advisor & Member BoD

MAS IT Network Manager, CISSP, CISM, ISMS Security Officer, CCNA, CCNP, CCSA, CSSA, ITILv3

Michael supports avantguard as an advisor and member of the Board of Directors. Together with the management, he uses his strategic thinking to shape the future direction of the company and develop it further. Michael has many years of experience and in-depth knowledge from various management positions in the cybersecurity sector. He also possesses strong leadership qualities and a valuable network.

Specialties:
Strategy, Risk Management, Networking

Andy Staub

Penetration Tester

Cyber Security Specialist FA, CAS Cyber Investigation & Digital Forensics

With over 20 years of experience in ICT, including many years as a system administrator in the SME environment and a degree as a Cyber Security Specialist FA, Andy now works as a penetration tester, checking our customers' systems for vulnerabilities. Based on his experience, he is convinced that many tasks in the ICT environment can be solved efficiently with existing standard tools – in line with the principle of 'less is more'.

Specialties:
Windows Environments, System Hardening

Mino Petrizzo

Penetration Tester

Informatiker EFZ, BSc CS

Mino supports us in penetration testing in analysing and evaluating vulnerabilities and applies his knowledge in a targeted manner in practice. His training began at a secondary school specialising in IT, during which he also worked as a web developer for a year. He then completed a bachelor's degree in computer science with a specialisation in cyber security and network & cloud infrastructures at OST.

Jonas Friedli

Penetration Tester

BSc CS, OSCP, BSCP, CRTO, OSWP, OPST, PSM I, PMPA, eMAPT

Jonas conducts penetration tests on our clients' systems and identifies vulnerabilities. Information security for him is not only a professional focus but also a personal commitment. With many years of experience as a Software Engineer and Penetration Tester, he understands the demands of complex systems and knows how to view them from both a developer's and an attacker's perspective.

Specialties:
Secure Development, Web Application Security, Code & Architecture Review

Ryan Wüest

Software Engineer

MSc ETH EE

Ryan supports the team as a Software Engineer by developing internal and external software solutions. Thanks to his experience with both high-level and low-level programming languages, solving any software problem is only a matter of time. Guided by his development philosophy, “Make it work, then make it right,” he delivers fast results before refining the product to perfection.

Specialties:
Software Development, GNU/Linux

Timofey Shpakov

Penetration Tester

ETH MSc CSE, OSCP, BSCP, PIPA

As a penetration tester, Timofey explores his clients’ systems and systematically assesses them for security vulnerabilities. Thanks to his many years of experience in software and machine learning engineering, as well as his corresponding academic focus at ETH Zurich, he brings a deep understanding of complex systems. In his spare time, he is also deeply involved in hardware and IoT hacking, which gives him a strong intuition for real-world attack surfaces in connected environments. His ambition to understand systems holistically is complemented by an attacker’s perspective. This enables him to precisely analyse vulnerabilities and to prioritise risks appropriately.

Web Application Security, IoT Security, Machine Learning/AI, GNU/Linux