Israeli-founded startup Zafran Security, the developer of an AI-native cyber threat exposure management platform, has landed a strategic investment from US tech giant Cisco Systems Inc.
The US maker of networking software and hardware has invested in Zafran through its venture capital arm Cisco Investments, the startup said late on Wednesday. The size of the investment was not disclosed but is estimated to increase Zafran’s previously announced $130 million total funding to more than $140 million, according to Hebrew press reports.
Cisco Investments joins existing investors including Sequoia Capital, Cyberstarts, Menlo Ventures, PSP Growth, Vintage Investment Partners, and American Express Ventures.
Zafran was founded in 2022 by Iranian-born cybersecurity research veteran Sanaz Yashar, CEO, Snir Havdala, and Ben Seri. The startup is the developer of a risk and mitigation platform that pledges to find and fix software security threats within hours, instead of weeks. The platform adapts, coordinates and synchronizes an organization’s existing arsenal of security tools to defend against cyber attacks.
Cisco Investments vice president Janey Hoe said the investment in Zafran is geared to “create a more unified, intelligence-driven security ecosystem that empowers our customers to better discover vulnerabilities and reduce risks in their infrastructure.”
“As the threat landscape grows increasingly complex in the AI era, the challenge for security teams has extended from identifying vulnerabilities to effectively orchestrating their remediation,” said Hoe.
Zafran’s platform uses AI and automation technology to manage threat exposure and mitigation as AI accelerates the speed and sophistication of developers and bad actors alike to find software flaws. One of the main challenges facing businesses is that attackers weaponize critical security flaws much faster than they can patch them, Cisco cautioned in a recent blog post.
In 2025, the median time it took companies to patch a critical vulnerability rose to 43 days, up from 32 days in 2024, according to Verizon’s annual data breach report.
“Organizations have made enormous investments in cybersecurity over the past decade. The opportunity now is to make those investments work together,” said Yashar. “AI has fundamentally changed how attackers operate, increasing the speed, scale and sophistication of exploitation.”
“We built Zafran to be the nerve center that helps organizations understand exploitability, identify where to act first, and mobilize the security controls they already have to reduce risk before exploitation occurs,” Yashar said.
Yashar served in the IDF’s elite cybersecurity intelligence unit 8200 for 15 years after fleeing with her family to Israel from Tehran at the age of 17. She has previously held senior roles at cyber threat detection firms FireEye, Mandiant and Cybereason, investigating Russian and Iranian state-sponsored attacks.
In May, Cisco announced the purchase of Israeli cybersecurity startup Astrix Security, marking the tech giant’s 20th acquisition made in recent years. The US firm has R&D centers in Caesarea, Netanya and Tel Aviv.
