Italian cybersecurity startup Exein has raised $270 million in a funding round led by Headline, valuing the Rome-based company at $1.7 billion and making it Europe's newest unicorn. Exein, which has secured over 2 billion connected devices, is expanding from IoT security into physical AI. The startup is developing a proprietary foundation model to combat machine-speed cyberattacks and plans to use the capital to accelerate its expansion in the US and Asia-Pacific regions.
Exein $270 million funding round
- ▪Exein's $270 million funding round included participation from Sofina, Goldman Sachs, European Investment Bank Group ETCI, KfW Capital, and T.Capital.
- ▪Exein upsized its existing revolving credit facility led by J.P. Morgan, with KfW joining as an additional lender.
- ▪Exein's valuation increased thirty-fold compared to its Series B round held approximately two years prior, and more than doubled since December 2025.
- ▪Exein reported that its annual recurring revenue for the first half of 2026 grew by 400% year-over-year.
- ▪Rome-based cybersecurity startup Exein raised $270 million in a funding round led by investment firm Headline, valuing the company at $1.7 billion.
Physical AI security solutions
- ▪Exein plans to introduce its new agentic security architecture by the end of 2026, with initial deployment of its foundation model scheduled for the first quarter of 2027.
- ▪Exein's cybersecurity technology has been deployed to protect more than 2 billion connected devices across sectors including aerospace, automotive, energy, and healthcare.
- ▪Exein is developing a proprietary foundation model for physical artificial intelligence security trained on machine telemetry data collected from over 2 billion devices.
Photon runtime protection technology
- ▪Exein's runtime security product, Photon, operates at the kernel level of connected devices to block malicious execution before an attack can run.
- ▪Exein integrates its Photon security features directly into products during the development stage by working with hardware manufacturers and silicon vendors.
AI-generated cyberattack threats
- ▪Exein CEO Gianni Cuozzo stated that open-source artificial intelligence models without built-in safeguards make cyberattacks on physical devices cheaper and easier.
- ▪The European Union's Cyber Resilience Act, which began reporting obligations in September 2026 and comes fully into force in December 2027, is expected to drive demand for Exein's solutions.
- ▪Exein reports detecting approximately 5,000 new, non-repetitive machine-speed attacks across its network each week, which is five times the level recorded in 2025.
US Asia-Pacific expansion plans
- ▪Exein plans to use its new funding to expand operations in the United States and the Asia-Pacific region, which currently generates about half of the company's revenue.
- ▪Exein plans to increase hiring in the United States, establish new partnerships, and open a new office in the San Francisco Bay Area over the next two years.
- ▪Exein intends to allocate a portion of its $270 million funding to pursue mergers and acquisitions to expand its product portfolio.
Debatable claims
- ▪Governments should restrict open-source AI models to prevent cyberattacks on physical devices
- ▪Critical infrastructure should rely on autonomous AI agents for cybersecurity defense
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