The proposed transaction would add cybersecurity technology to the business Cohere is assembling through its planned combination with Germany’s Aleph Alpha, a deal reported to be worth approximately $20 billion. AISLE’s engineering hub in Prague would also broaden the group’s European footprint. The financial terms of the proposed acquisition have not been disclosed.
Cohere said the move was intended to strengthen security and threat-detection services for enterprise and public-sector customers. The combined business is expected to support private deployment, allowing clients to operate systems within their own infrastructure rather than relying exclusively on external platforms.
The acquisition proposal comes as businesses and governments face growing pressure to secure software systems against increasingly sophisticated cyber threats. AI tools can help security teams identify weaknesses in code, prioritise potential vulnerabilities and accelerate parts of the review process. However, these capabilities also require careful validation to ensure that identified risks are genuine and that automated tools do not introduce additional security problems.
AISLE was founded in 2025 by Ondrej Vlcek, the former chief executive of Czech antivirus company Avast, alongside co-founders with backgrounds at Google DeepMind and Anthropic. The start-up said its AI systems identified more than 500 previously unknown bugs in widely used software during its first year, including 12 vulnerabilities in OpenSSL. The vulnerabilities were fixed after discovery, according to the company. OpenSSL is widely used to encrypt internet traffic, including communications involving banks, governments and messaging services.
The proposed deal reflects the growing overlap between AI development and cybersecurity. As organisations adopt more capable AI systems, the tools used to protect digital infrastructure must also adapt to changing threats. Software vulnerabilities can expose sensitive information, interrupt essential services and create risks for public institutions and commercial operators.
For Cohere, the acquisition could broaden its product offering beyond AI models and enterprise applications, while giving it access to specialist security expertise. Its success will depend on completing the transaction and integrating AISLE’s technology into services that meet the operational requirements of customers.
More broadly, the proposal illustrates how AI companies are pursuing security capabilities as part of their expansion strategies. The challenge will be to turn promising vulnerability-detection technology into dependable protection at scale, while maintaining rigorous testing and accountability.
