F5 to acquire CalypsoAI to bring advanced AI guardrails to large enterprises

CalypsoAI’s adaptive AI inference security solutions will enable companies to deliver AI apps more securely

F5 (NASDAQ: FFIV), the global leader in delivering and securing every app and API, today announced its intent to acquire a pioneer in enterprise AI security. CalypsoAI’s award-winning platform brings real-time threat defense, red teaming at scale, and data security to enterprises racing to deploy generative and agentic AI. These capabilities will be integrated into the F5 Application Delivery and Security Platform (ADSP) to create the most complete solution for securing AI inference.

“AI is redefining enterprise architecture, and the attack surface companies must defend,” said François Locoh-Donou, President and CEO of F5. “Traditional firewalls and point solutions can’t keep up. The addition of CalypsoAI will give enterprises the confidence to innovate faster and better protect critical data as they rely on F5 to deliver and secure apps, APIs, and AI models across their environment.”

Enterprises are rapidly embedding AI into products and operations, but the new AI stack—spanning applications, agents, APIs, models, and data stores—creates a new and highly dynamic attack surface. Traditional controls are not keeping pace with sophisticated new threats, while mounting regulatory pressure alongside the spread of shadow AI usage heightens risk and compliance gaps. Security teams need a purpose-built and model-agnostic approach that provides guardrails for how AI interacts with data, users, and threats and provides centralized visibility across their infrastructure.

In their recent Market Guide on AI Trust, Risk and Security Management (TRiSM), Gartner® states, “The AI TRiSM market is distinguished by its independence from frontier model provider solutions that also support trust risk and security management. Enterprises must retain independence from any single AI model or hosting provider to ensure scalability, flexibility, cost control and trust, as AI markets rapidly mature and change.” ¹

F5 is aiming to tackle this need with CalypsoAI’s adaptive AI security capabilities that deliver proactive and continuous AI protection regardless of model or cloud, including:

• Adversarial threat protection: Protection against new AI threats like prompt injection and jailbreak attacks with real-time threat management. Proactive red-teaming tests against more than 10,000 new attack prompts each month to produce a risk score.
• Secure data: Guardrails detect and prevent sensitive data leakage and policy violations at runtime and audit AI interactions across models.
• Unified visibility and governance: Centralized observability, policy control, and audit logs make it easier to meet GDPR/EU AI Act requirements across SaaS, on-premises, and hybrid environments.

“Enterprises want to move fast with AI while reducing the risk of data leaks, unsafe outputs, or compliance failures,” said Donnchadh Casey, CEO of CalypsoAI. “Our customers rely on us to pressure test AI systems at scale, set inference layer guardrails that adapt as models change, and to gain visibility and auditability across their AI estate. F5 and CalypsoAI are more than the sum of their parts: high performance application delivery and AI security that enable businesses to deliver innovation faster without increasing risk.”

Transaction details 

F5 will acquire all issued and outstanding shares of CalypsoAI, a private company with major operations in Dublin, Ireland for $180 million in purchase consideration financed primarily with cash. The transaction is expected to be immaterial to F5’s revenue and operating results.  

The acquisition is subject to customary closing conditions and is expected to close in F5’s fourth quarter fiscal year 2025, ending September 30, 2025. 

Foros Advisors LLC acted as financial advisor to F5 while Sullivan & Cromwell LLP acted as legal advisor. Cooley LLP provided legal counsel to CalypsoAI. 

Also read: Viksit Workforce for a Viksit Bharat

Do Follow: The Mainstream formerly known as CIO News LinkedIn Account | The Mainstream formerly known as CIO News Facebook | The Mainstream formerly known as CIO News Youtube | The Mainstream formerly known as CIO News Twitter |The Mainstream formerly known as CIO News Whatsapp Channel | The Mainstream formerly known as CIO News Instagram

About us:

The Mainstream formerly known as CIO News is a premier platform dedicated to delivering latest news, updates, and insights from the tech industry. With its strong foundation of intellectual property and thought leadership, the platform is well-positioned to stay ahead of the curve and lead conversations about how technology shapes our world. From its early days as CIO News to its rebranding as The Mainstream on November 28, 2024, it has been expanding its global reach, targeting key markets in the Middle East & Africa, ASEAN, the USA, and the UK. The Mainstream is a vision to put technology at the center of every conversation, inspiring professionals and organizations to embrace the future of tech.