Help desk work is about to get a lot more automated at Palo Alto Networks customers. The security giant has bought Console, a startup whose AI agents handle password resets, app access requests and routine troubleshooting, paying $500M in cash and stock for the two-year-old company.
The price, confirmed by two people with knowledge of the deal after the companies announced the acquisition Tuesday, dwarfs the $29M Console raised across two rounds. A $6.2M seed came from Thrive Capital, and a $23M Series A was co-led by DST Global and Thrive. PitchBook valued Console at $157M before the sale.
Founder Andrei Serban previously built Fuzzbuzz, a code-security platform that Rippling acquired. His new venture counted Ramp, Flock Safety and Scale AI among its customers, with agents resolving issues end to end rather than just flagging them for human teams.
Console’s technology will live inside Cortex, Palo Alto Networks’ AI-driven security platform. Security teams will be able to investigate and resolve alerts using natural language, which CEO Nikesh Arora described as giving Cortex the ability to deliver autonomous security outcomes across the enterprise. Arora had backed Console personally as an angel investor, along with SV Angel and Abstract Ventures.
The deal consolidates the agentic IT support market, where Console competed with Serval, a ServiceNow challenger valued at $1B after a $75M Sequoia-led round. Serval now stands as the category’s leading independent startup, and Console’s exit shows acquirers will pay heavily for small agent teams that solve enterprise workflows.
