Italian cybersecurity company Exein has joined the global unicorn club after raising $270 million in new funding at a valuation of $1.7 billion, marking a major milestone for Italy’s technology ecosystem and accelerating the company’s expansion in the United States.
Founded in Rome in 2018 by Gianni Cuozzo, Exein specializes in cybersecurity embedded directly into connected devices and intelligent machines. Its technology is already deployed across more than 2 billion devices worldwide, protecting systems in industries including automotive, aerospace, healthcare, energy, industrial automation and semiconductors.
The latest investment round was led by Headline, a venture capital firm with a major presence in San Francisco, and included Goldman Sachs alongside Sofina, the European Investment Bank, KfW Capital and T.Capital. Existing investors also participated. Exein additionally expanded a revolving credit facility led by J.P. Morgan.
The new capital gives the company significant resources for its next phase of American growth. Exein plans to increase its U.S. workforce, customer base and partnerships over the next 2 years and open a new office in the San Francisco Bay Area. The company is also considering acquisitions in the United States and Europe to accelerate its technological and geographic expansion.
The American market is particularly important as Exein shifts its focus toward what it calls Physical AI – artificial intelligence embedded in machines capable of perceiving, making decisions and acting in the physical world. These include robots, drones, autonomous vehicles, industrial systems and other intelligent devices.
Exein says its global network is now encountering approximately 5,000 new, non-repetitive cyberattacks every week – about 5 times last year’s volume. Its approach is based on giving individual devices the ability to defend themselves rather than relying exclusively on external network security.
The company has already introduced Photon, a runtime security technology designed to stop malicious activity at the operating-system kernel level before it can cause damage. Exein is also developing a proprietary foundation model trained using telemetry from its network of more than 2 billion devices. The goal is to create autonomous security agents capable of identifying and countering attacks at machine speed.
Growth has been rapid. Exein’s valuation has increased roughly 30-fold in 2 years, from about $55 million to $1.7 billion. In the first half of 2026, annual recurring revenue increased 4 times year over year, while first-half revenue was nearly double the total recorded during all of 2025.
For an Italian company born in Rome, the combination of American capital, a planned Bay Area presence and growing U.S. operations represents an important new chapter. Exein is positioning Italian cybersecurity technology directly inside one of the world’s most competitive innovation markets – while keeping its technological roots in Europe.
