Palo Alto Networks CEO Nikesh Arora engaged in acquisition discussions with Okta and Datadog in late 2024 and early 2025, according to a report by The Information. The talks with Okta, led by CEO Todd McKinnon, centered on product complementarity but stalled due to valuation disagreements. At the time, Okta’s market capitalization stood near $13.5 billion at the start of 2024 and climbed roughly 30% to approach $23 billion.
Arora also approached Datadog CEO Olivier Pomel in spring 2025 with a potential acquisition pitch when Datadog was publicly valued at more than $40 billion. Pomel declined, and no formal offer was made. Since then, Datadog’s market cap has roughly doubled to exceed $80 billion.
Palo Alto’s acquisition strategy proceeded with the $25 billion purchase of CyberArk in July 2025, followed by the $3.35 billion acquisition of Chronosphere in January 2026. The combined revenue contribution from CyberArk and Chronosphere reached $338 million in Palo Alto’s April quarter, which totaled $3 billion in revenue, the company reported in June.
The CEO’s dealmaking reflects a broader shift in cybersecurity priorities, driven by the rise of AI-powered threats. Arora has emphasized that AI agents can execute cyberattacks beyond human capability, elevating continuous system monitoring to a boardroom imperative. Anthropic and OpenAI have intensified this trend by introducing AI-powered vulnerability-detection tools, including Anthropic’s Mythos platform launched in May. OpenAI has also disclosed internal and third-party security breaches, further tightening enterprise security budgets.
