Akto

Akto is a small, venture-backed startup (founded 2022, $4.5M raised) that pivoted hard from open-source API security to agentic AI security in 2025, claiming to be the first purpose-built platform for securing AI agents, MCP servers, and LLMs. Its core value proposition -- discovery, red teaming, and runtime guardrails in one platform -- is credible in principle, but the company is very early-stage, the agentic security category itself is still nascent, and the "industry-first" and "Fortune 500" claims are largely self-reported marketing language without named customer validation. G2 reviewers flag complex setup and poor documentation as recurring complaints, and a third-party review notes the platform lacks robust runtime anomaly detection on the API side. For a large enterprise, Akto represents a bet on a fast-moving but unproven startup in a category where larger incumbents (CrowdStrike, Palo Alto) are also moving quickly.