SaaS Observability Vendor Expands Capabilities With Real-Time Telemetry Acquisition
By Michael Novinson
Date: July 10, 2026
In a significant move to enhance its operational capabilities, Infoblox has announced plans to acquire Kentik, a San Francisco-based vendor specializing in network intelligence and observability. This strategic acquisition aims to provide clients with a more integrated view of their network and security environments. By unifying these distinct operational functions, Infoblox intends to address the evolving complexities faced by enterprises today.
A Unified Approach to Network Security and Operations
Scott Harrell, CEO of Infoblox, articulated the rationale behind this acquisition, emphasizing the necessity for a consolidated operational framework. Currently, many organizations operate on disparate platforms for their security and network operations, which can lead to inefficiencies and misalignments. Harrell noted, "Rather than forcing security teams and network operations teams to work from separate platforms, the proposed acquisition of Kentik will give Infoblox clients a single source of visibility." As enterprise environments grow increasingly distributed, this capability is poised to become more critical.
The growing prominence of artificial intelligence (AI) within business infrastructures adds another layer of complexity to this landscape. As enterprises begin implementing AI technologies more broadly, Harrell pointed out that this progress will demand a harmonization of network services with observability. "As artificial intelligence becomes more predominant in people’s environments, the complexity of what they’re dealing with, whether it is from a networking point of view or security point of view, is only going to rise," he stated. Thus, integrating these elements in real-time can provide much-needed clarity and comprehension of organizational environments.
Kentik’s Profile and Contributions
Founded in 2014 and boasting a workforce of 230 employees, Kentik has raised a total of $102 million, including a successful $40 million Series C funding round led by Third Point Ventures in October 2021. The firm has been under the leadership of Avi Freedman, who previously served as chief network scientist at Akamai. His extensive experience in the industry provides Kentik with a robust foundation for its services.
Harrell outlined the distinctions between traditional enterprise applications and modern AI systems. "Unlike traditional enterprise applications, AI systems generate more dynamic communication patterns involving foundation models, AI agents, cloud services, and distributed infrastructure." Given this evolution, traditional monitoring approaches—which were built for more predictable architectures—will likely become obsolete. The need for network observability as a foundation for AI implementations is highlighted here, with Harrell echoing a crucial sentiment: "If the data feeding AI operations conflicts, is wrong, or is stale, the answers the foundational models give you are going to be wrong."
Streamlined Data Aggregation and Usability
One of the standout features of Kentik is its ability to aggregate network flow data effectively across hybrid and cloud environments, utilizing a Software-as-a-Service (SaaS) architecture. This model enables customers to avoid the burdensome requirement of deploying extensive infrastructure. As Harrell underscored, "Kentik hides much of the underlying technical complexity from customers, making sophisticated observability significantly easier to deploy and operate."
Moreover, the collaborative integration of Kentik’s platform will facilitate the automatic association of network flows with vital information such as real-time device identities, ownership details, DNS history, and threat intelligence. This means security analysts and network operators can gain immediate context without the need for tedious manual correlations. "We’re going to auto-populate the asset context into the flow records," Harrell stated. This innovation stands to enhance the speed and efficiency of investigations while simultaneously improving overall security posture.
A Future Driven by AI and Real-Time Insights
Looking ahead, Harrell envisions a landscape where customers will be able to interact with complex data sets using natural language queries. "We want to bring those solutions together so a customer can unlock what’s historically been hard-to-analyze data and just ask natural language questions across data that spans flow data, endpoint data, and DNS data." The combined platform aims to eliminate the need for administrators to sift through multiple consoles, making data access more intuitive and user-friendly.
Harrell emphasized the importance of having authoritative and trustworthy data to support successful AI-driven operations. Since Infoblox specializes in controlling DNS and DHCP data, and Kentik offers real-time flow telemetry, this merger positions the new entity to provide a high-quality data foundation essential for enterprise AI functions. "We can codify decades of operational experience around DNS, DHCP, and flow data, bring them together and hand that to the customer as a turnkey solution," Harrell concluded.
Additionally, following Infoblox’s acquisition of assets from NetSPI’s external attack surface management business, the integration of Kentik’s capabilities further solidifies the company’s commitment to enhancing exposure management. While there may not yet be overwhelming demand for AI-driven network observability, Harrell indicated that a rapid adoption rate is on the horizon, making this acquisition timely and strategic for addressing future challenges.