Cato Networks
Israeli-founded SASE and AI-security leader. Founded 2015 by Shlomo Kramer and Gur Shatz. 2025 ARR above $350M at 43% YoY growth; $4.8B valuation on a $409M Series G; over 4,000 enterprise customers.
Cato Networks is an Israeli-founded cybersecurity and networking company that built one of the original platforms in the Secure Access Service Edge (SASE) category — a unified cloud-delivered architecture combining wide-area networking and network security into a single global service. The company is headquartered in Tel Aviv with international offices across the United States, Europe, and Asia-Pacific. As of the end of 2025, Cato served more than 4,000 enterprises worldwide, reported annual recurring revenue above $350 million, and carried a private-market valuation of more than $4.8 billion.
Cato was founded in 2015 by Shlomo Kramer and Gur Shatz (who later left the company). Kramer is one of the most prolific Israeli cybersecurity founders of the last three decades — a co-founder of Check Point Software Technologies in 1993 alongside Gil Shwed and Marius Nacht, and a co-founder of Imperva, which Thoma Bravo took private in 2018 in a transaction valued at approximately $2.1 billion. Cato is Kramer's third venture-scale cybersecurity company.
The SASE thesis
SASE — a term formally defined by Gartner in 2019 — describes the convergence of software-defined wide-area networking (SD-WAN) and network security functions (secure web gateway, cloud access security broker, zero-trust network access, firewall-as-a-service) into a single cloud-delivered service. Cato began building toward that model in 2015, four years before the analyst community named the category. The Cato SASE Cloud Platform replaces traditional MPLS networks, regional firewalls, secure web gateways, and remote-access VPNs with a single cloud-native service running on a global private backbone of points of presence.
The commercial pitch is consolidation: fewer vendors, fewer appliances, simpler operations, consistent policy enforcement regardless of where users or workloads sit. Cato competes within the SASE category alongside Zscaler, Palo Alto Networks Prisma Access, Netskope, and Cisco's SASE portfolio.
Growth and financials
In February 2026, Cato disclosed that its 2025 ARR crossed $350 million, growing 43% year-over-year against a Gartner-projected SASE market growth rate of 26% CAGR through 2028. The company has not yet reported profitability.
"Cato's mission is to fundamentally simplify and modernize enterprise networking and security, and our growth is a direct reflection of that vision. Surpassing $350 million in annual recurring revenue is a significant milestone that underscores the strong demand from Fortune 500 and Forbes Global 2000 enterprises for the Cato SASE Platform."
— Shlomo Kramer, co-founder and CEO, Cato Networks, February 24, 2026
In June 2025, Cato closed a Series G round of $359 million led by new investors Vitruvian Partners and ION Crossover Partners, with continued participation from Lightspeed Venture Partners, Acrew Capital, and Adams Street Partners. An extension brought the round to $409 million in total. The transaction valued Cato at more than $4.8 billion and pushed cumulative funding past $1 billion. Roughly $120 million of the round was structured as a secondary sale by employees, giving long-serving staff liquidity while the company's long-anticipated IPO — once expected in 2025 — was again postponed.
"With more than 3,500 enterprise customers, consistent hyper-growth, and repetitive and scalable wins against all leading competitors, Cato is a proven and mature business to invest in. Our true SASE platform and decade of AI innovation differentiates Cato from legacy vendors that favor a portfolio of point solutions."
— Shlomo Kramer, June 30, 2025
Prior rounds included a $238 million raise in 2023 at a $3 billion valuation, and a $200 million round in 2021 at $2.5 billion. Lightspeed Venture Partners' Ravi Mhatre joined the board in 2023; former Mellanox co-founder Eyal Waldman and former Varonis CFO Gili Iohan joined in the run-up to the postponed IPO.
AI direction and the Aim Security acquisition
Cato's product roadmap increasingly centers on what the company calls AI security — capabilities that allow enterprises to adopt generative AI across the business under controlled policy. In September 2025, Cato acquired Israeli AI-security startup Aim Security for approximately $350 million, folding Aim's data-protection and prompt-monitoring technology into the broader Cato platform. The company has also disclosed participation in OpenAI's Daybreak Cyber Partner program.
"With Cato, AI handles the noise so our customers can focus on strategy. We're embedding AI into the DNA of infrastructure itself. Routine tasks are automated. Response workflows are accelerated. Risk management decisions are guided by actionable live data, not outdated reports."
— Shlomo Kramer, June 30, 2025
Analyst recognition
Cato was named a Leader in the 2025 Gartner Magic Quadrant for SASE Platforms for a second consecutive year, a Leader and Outperformer in the 2025 GigaOm Radar Report for SASE for a second consecutive year, and named to the 2025 Forbes Cloud 100 and the 2026 Fortune Cyber 60. The company is a multi-year sponsor of the BWT Alpine Formula One team and announced in early 2026 that it will triple the size of its Prague R&D center over the following year.
Position in the Israeli cyber cohort
Cato sits inside the broader Israeli-rooted enterprise-cybersecurity cohort alongside Check Point, CyberArk, Wiz, and Snyk. Within the Israeli founder ecosystem, Shlomo Kramer's serial-founder track record — Check Point, Imperva, Cato — places the company in a recognized lineage of enterprise-security platforms originating in Israel and scaled internationally. Cato is one of the most cited Israeli-rooted private cybersecurity companies in coverage of SASE and the broader enterprise network-security consolidation theme.
Key facts
- Founded: 2015, by Shlomo Kramer and Gur Shatz.
- CEO: Shlomo Kramer (co-founder).
- Headquarters: Tel Aviv, Israel.
- R&D: Israel and Prague (tripling in 2026).
- Category: Secure Access Service Edge (SASE) and AI security.
- Customers: more than 4,000 enterprises worldwide.
- 2025 ARR: more than $350 million (up 43% YoY).
- Valuation: more than $4.8 billion (Series G, June 2025).
- Total funding: more than $1 billion.
- Notable acquisition: Aim Security, September 2025, approximately $350 million.
- Analyst recognition: Leader, Gartner Magic Quadrant for SASE Platforms, 2025 (second consecutive year).
Sources
Cato Networks press release, "Cato Surpasses $350 Million ARR with 43% YoY Growth in 2025," February 24, 2026. Cato Networks press release, "Cato Raises $359 Million at a Valuation of More Than $4.8 Billion," June 30, 2025. Calcalist / Ctech reporting on Cato's Series G and IPO timing, June 30, 2025 and February 24, 2026. Times of Israel reporting on Cato's 2023 Series F. Gartner, Forecast Analysis: Secure Access Service Edge, Worldwide, February 5, 2025.
