Palo Alto Networks paid $500 million in cash and stock to acquire Console, a two-year-old startup that uses AI agents to automate routine IT help desk tasks, according to two people with knowledge of the deal. The companies announced the acquisition on Tuesday but did not reveal the terms. Console, founded in 2024, had raised $29 million across two rounds prior to the sale, including a $6.2 million seed led by Thrive Capital and a $23 million Series A co-led by DST Global and Thrive.
Before the sale, Console was valued at $157 million, according to PitchBook, delivering a rapid return for investors including SV Angel, Abstract Ventures, and notably Palo Alto Networks CEO Nikesh Arora, who participated as an angel investor. Palo Alto Networks declined to comment on the transaction. The cybersecurity firm said it will integrate Console into Cortex, its platform that uses AI to automatically detect and neutralize threats.
Arora described Console’s agentic functionality as giving security teams the ability to investigate and resolve alerts using natural language, providing Cortex with the means to deliver autonomous security outcomes across the entire enterprise. Console was founded by Andrei Serban, shortly after his previous startup, the code-security platform Fuzzbuzz, was acquired by Rippling. The startup’s customers included Ramp, Flock Safety, and Scale AI, and its technology automated tasks such as password resets, granting access to apps like Figma and Miro, and performing routine troubleshooting without direct human involvement.
As a startup, Console competed primarily with Serval, another ServiceNow challenger that reached a $1 billion valuation after raising a $75 million Series B round led by Sequoia last December. Serval started as an AI tech support tool and quickly expanded to provide AI assistance for human resources, legal, and finance departments. One investor, who is not a backer of Serval, told TechCrunch that Console’s acquisition leaves Serval as the category-leader-to-watch among startups automating IT service management.
Console is Palo Alto Networks’ seventh acquisition in 2026, according to PitchBook. Other venture-backed companies the cybersecurity giant bought this year include Greylock and Lux Capital-backed observability platform Chronosphere, at a valuation of $3.35 billion, and Koi, a cyber startup backed by Battery and Team8, for $400 million. The deal underscores the broader U.S. market trend of large security vendors consolidating AI-driven automation startups to expand their enterprise offerings.
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