Kai Exits Stealth with $125M to Fight AI Attacks with Agentic AI

SAN JOSE, Calif. – March 10, 2026 – In a bold move to reshape the digital defense landscape, cybersecurity startup Kai has emerged from stealth mode, armed with $125 million in funding and a mission to combat machine-speed threats with machine-speed defense. The company is introducing what it calls the first agentic AI cybersecurity platform, designed to autonomously reason, act, and adapt, moving beyond the human-limited workflows that define today's security operations.

The significant funding round was led by Evolution Equity Partners, a firm with a deep portfolio in cybersecurity, with participation from N47 and other strategic investors. The capital injection signals strong investor confidence in Kai's approach, which eschews incremental upgrades in favor of a complete rebuild of the security stack from first principles. The company was founded by proven industry veterans Galina Antova, formerly of industrial security pioneer Claroty, and Dr. Damiano Bolzoni, co-founder of SecurityMatters, which was acquired by Forescout.

The New Battlefield: AI vs. AI

The cybersecurity industry is at a critical inflection point. Adversaries are increasingly leveraging artificial intelligence to launch sophisticated, high-speed attacks that can overwhelm traditional defenses and the security teams that manage them. Human analysts, buried under an avalanche of alerts from dozens of fragmented security tools, are struggling to keep pace. This “tool sprawl” creates data silos and operational bottlenecks, making it nearly impossible to detect and respond to threats before significant damage is done.

"Cybersecurity is quickly becoming a contest between AI systems," said Galina Antova, co-founder and CEO of Kai, in a statement. "The decisive factor is which side has richer data and can act at machine speed with human expert accuracy."

Kai's platform is built on the premise that human-driven processes are no longer sufficient. Instead of providing another dashboard or alert system, the company has developed a unified platform powered by intelligent agents. These agents are designed to perform the actual security work end-to-end—from contextualizing threat intelligence and managing exposure to executing detection and response—without the constant need for human intervention. This approach aims to transform security professionals from overwhelmed responders into proactive, strategic defenders.

Beyond Automation: The Rise of Agentic AI

Kai’s core innovation lies in its application of agentic AI, a concept gaining significant traction across the technology landscape. Unlike generative AI, which creates content, or traditional machine learning models that primarily classify and correlate data, agentic AI systems are designed for autonomous action. They can understand high-level goals, break them down into executable steps, and dynamically orchestrate tools to achieve objectives.

Industry analysts have noted the rapid rise in enterprise interest in this technology. According to recent reports from firms like Gartner and Forrester, agentic systems represent a new class of AI built for autonomy and multi-step decision-making in complex environments. Kai's platform leverages this capability to create a continuous, unified pipeline for security operations, eliminating the boundaries between functions like threat intelligence, exposure management, and incident response.

"AI has ushered in a new era for cybersecurity, disrupting traditional defense while enabling new, automated attacks humans alone can't match," noted Richard Seewald, Founder and Managing Partner at lead investor Evolution Equity Partners. "Kai's approach was designed to close that gap by letting agentic AI prioritize action and execute response. That shift is why we backed Kai, and why enterprises are moving quickly to adopt it."

While the promise of autonomous systems is immense, it also introduces new considerations. Experts caution that agentic AI requires robust guardrails to ensure that actions taken are both accurate and safe, preventing systems from prioritizing speed over security in critical moments. Kai states its platform is built by PhD- and postdoctoral-level AI researchers with this challenge in mind, aiming to deliver not just speed, but also expert-level accuracy.

Proven Leadership and Early Market Validation

Kai enters the market with a significant advantage: a founding team with a history of creating and scaling industry-defining companies. CEO Galina Antova co-founded Claroty, now a multi-billion dollar leader in securing the operational technology (OT) and cyber-physical systems that run the world’s critical infrastructure. CTO Dr. Damiano Bolzoni co-founded SecurityMatters, another OT security pioneer that was successfully acquired by Forescout Technologies. Their combined experience in converging the disparate worlds of IT and OT security lends immense credibility to their new venture.

This leadership has translated into remarkable early traction. In just 10 months since writing its first line of code, Kai has already secured multiple large enterprise customers, generating over seven figures in bookings. Its client base spans demanding verticals such as energy, pharmaceuticals, automotive, and hospitality, including several Fortune 500 companies.

A key proof point is Kai’s successful graduation from the Chevron Technology Ventures (CTV) Catalyst Program. This initiative is designed to accelerate the maturation of technologies with the potential to improve Chevron's complex global operations. Kai's ability to meet every milestone in the program serves as a powerful validation of its platform's capabilities in one of the world's most challenging industrial environments.

A Vision for a Unified Security Operating System

Kai's ambition extends far beyond disrupting a single security category. The company's long-term vision is to become the AI-powered operating system for the entire enterprise, unifying all cybersecurity and IT functions. This strategy directly confronts the persistent problem of siloed tools and teams that plagues large organizations, hindering efficiency and increasing risk.

"Attackers don't think in categories. Defense shouldn't either," explained Dr. Bolzoni. "Kai allows enterprises to eliminate silos, transform entire security functions, and reduce risk faster than was ever possible with human-led workflows."

While established players like Palo Alto Networks, CrowdStrike, and SentinelOne are integrating AI into their own expanding platforms, Kai’s strategy is to rebuild from the ground up rather than bolt AI onto existing architectures. This fundamental re-architecture is what the company believes will enable true machine-speed operations across the enterprise.

The $125 million in funding will be instrumental in realizing this vision. The capital will be used to accelerate go-to-market expansion, deepen the company's advanced AI research, and scale the platform to meet what is already proving to be strong global demand for a new way to approach cybersecurity.