Cloud identity security startup Apono Inc. revealed today that it has raised $34 million in new funding to accelerate development of artificial intelligence-powered access intelligence and policy administration and expand its go-to-market operations.

Founded in 2022, Apono offers a platform that is built to eliminate one of the longstanding weaknesses in enterprise access management: standing privileges.

The company’s service takes on the issue whereby traditional identity and access management systems often leave users and systems with broad, persistent permissions that create unnecessary risk. Apono replaces the static model with a dynamic, real-time approach that aligns access with actual need, context and business logic.

Apono’s platform is based around what the company calls a Zero Standing Privilege framework, which revokes permanent access and instead issues permissions only when required. The framework’s Just-in-Time and Just-Enough-Access models evaluate each access request as it happens, granting temporary permissions that automatically expire when the task is complete.

The platform is built for modern cloud environments, where the explosion of cloud services, identities and application programming interfaces has made privilege sprawl a growing concern. The platform integrates with hybrid and multicloud environments to unify visibility across human, machine and AI identities.

Apono helps enterprises maintain consistent controls even as their infrastructure scales by automating access workflows and enforcing guardrails based on role, context and operational activity.

“The large-scale adoption of AI agents exponentially scales the problem of getting access right.” said co-founder and Chief Executive Rom Carmel. “Achieving Zero Standing Privilege with a dynamic access management approach is the only sustainable way to secure agentic operations at scale.”

Apono customers, including Intel Corp., Hewlett Packard Enterprise Co. and Workday Inc., rely on Apono to secure access across hybrid and multicloud environments while meeting compliance standards and accelerating incident response.

The Series B round was led by U.S. Venture Partners LP, with Swisscom Ventures AG, Vertex Ventures Holdings Ltd., 33N Ventures and existing investors also participating. Jacques Benkoski, general partner at USVP, will join Apono’s board.

“Apono is leading the next evolution of identity security — one that brings zero trust to identity access, following the zero-trust network access we’ve seen in recent years,” said Benkoski. “The company’s dynamic, context-aware approach is exactly what enterprises need to secure both human and machine identities in the AI-driven era.”

The new funding takes the total raised by Apono to date to $54 million. The company’s last round was a $15.5 million Series A in September 2024.

Image: Apono