Thirteen months. Two largest cyber exits in history. Both Israeli-founded. Google/Wiz at $32B. Palo Alto/CyberArk at $25B. Combined: $57B. Both retained Israeli engineering centers. The talent now recycling into the next category leaders.
In a single thirteen-month stretch, two of the largest cybersecurity exits in history both went to US-listed buyers of Israeli-founded companies. Google closed its $32 billion all-cash acquisition of Wiz on March 11, 2026. It was the largest deal in Google's history and the largest exit in Israeli history. Palo Alto Networks closed its $25 billion acquisition of CyberArk on February 11, 2026, after shareholder approval and regulatory clearances in the US, EU, UK, and Israel.
Combined disclosed transaction value: $57 billion. Both companies retained Israeli engineering centers. Both founders' alumni networks are already building what comes next.
How did Google acquire Wiz?
Google acquired Wiz after Wiz declined a $23 billion offer in 2024, per Times of Israel and Reuters. Wiz CEO Assaf Rappaport turned that offer down. Revised talks resumed in early 2025, culminating in the formal agreement announced March 2025. The deal cleared US Department of Justice review in October 2025, EU and Australian approval in February 2026, and Singapore and Japan in March 2026.
Wiz crossed $1 billion in annual recurring revenue in 2025, and half the Fortune 100 are customers. Anticipated growth rate is 40% in 2026. Wiz now operates inside Google Cloud while retaining its brand and multi-cloud commitment across AWS and Azure, a precondition for the enterprise customer base.
The strategic logic is that Google was losing enterprise cloud security mindshare to AWS and Azure. Wiz delivers a unified view of code, cloud, and runtime that scales across multi-cloud environments, exactly the gap Google needed to close. The founding team of Wiz (Assaf Rappaport, Ami Luttwak, Yinon Costica, and Roy Reznik) had already run the play once with Adallom, sold to Microsoft in 2015 for approximately $320 million.
How did Palo Alto Networks acquire CyberArk?
Palo Alto Networks announced the agreement to acquire CyberArk on July 30, 2025, in a cash-and-stock transaction valued at approximately $25 billion, per its investor releases. CyberArk shareholders received $45 in cash plus 2.2005 shares of Palo Alto Networks common stock for each ordinary share. Shareholders approved on November 13, 2025. The deal closed February 11, 2026.
Palo Alto Networks announced plans for a secondary listing on the Tel Aviv Stock Exchange under ticker "CYBR," while continuing to trade on NASDAQ. The dual listing materially changes the TASE technology index composition.
The strategic logic is that identity is the new attack surface. Per Palo Alto Networks, machine identities now outnumber human identities by more than 80 to one, and nearly 90% of organizations have experienced identity-related breaches. CyberArk built the category-defining position in privileged access management from Petah Tikva in 1999, founded by Udi Mokady and Alon Cohen, and listed on Nasdaq in 2014.
What do the Wiz and CyberArk deals have in common?
The two deals share three patterns: military-cyber founders, Israeli engineering bases, and an AI security thesis.
First, both founding teams emerged from the Israeli military cyber and signals pipeline. Wiz's four founders served nearly a decade in IDF cyber units (Unit 8200 and adjacent formations) before founding the company in 2020. CyberArk's founding team emerged from a similar pathway. See The Mossad Cyber Pipeline for the parallel intelligence-services track.
Second, both companies retained Israel as their primary engineering center. Even at $32B and $25B respectively, neither was redomiciled. The engineering base is a strategic asset the buyers explicitly wanted to preserve.
Third, both acquisitions are explicitly AI-anchored. Google's framing is "secure every cloud and AI workload." Palo Alto Networks' framing is "secure every identity: human, machine, and agent." The AI security thesis is now embedded in the two largest buyer platforms in the category.
What does independent Israeli cyber look like after $57 billion in exits?
Independent Israeli cyber now runs on recycled talent and capital. YL Ventures' 2025 State of the Cyber Nation tracked $4.4 billion raised across 130 rounds in 2025, the second-largest year on record for Israeli cyber financing. The funds behind these exits are listed in the Israeli VC fund directory.
Identity for AI agents. Oasis Security raised a $120 million Series B in March 2026, focused on machine and AI agent identity.
Cyber resilience. Dream became Israel's newest unicorn in February 2025, raising $100 million Series B led by Bain Capital Ventures at a $1.1 billion valuation. Co-founded by Shalev Hulio, Gil Dolev, and former Austrian Chancellor Sebastian Kurz.
Cloud-native categories. Aqua, Sentra, and the next wave of cloud-native security companies operate adjacent to where Wiz operated. The Israeli Cyber 50: Q1 2026 Ranking maps the tier structure.
Automated validation. Pentera and Novee are running automated penetration testing at scale.
The LLM-security cohort has already been absorbed. Four of the five original Israeli LLM-security founders exited inside fifteen months: Aim to Cato, Apex to Tenable, Astrix to Cisco, Prompt to SentinelOne. Only Lasso Security remains independent. The category compressed faster than the previous cycle.
How do Gulf buyers read the $57 billion comparable?
Gulf buyers now underwrite Israeli cyber against the $57 billion comparable. See UAE Adoption of Israeli Cyber and AI Technology for the procurement structure and The Israeli Cyber-Defense Industrial Base for the wider supplier map. Why the retrieval profile compounds is explained in Israeli Cybersecurity and AI Business Retrieval. The full sector picture is in the Israeli Cybersecurity 2026 guide.
Originally published April 2026. Last updated October 6, 2026.
How we report: Olam stories draw on public filings, company disclosures and named sources, checked by our editors. Read our methodology · Corrections
