Kela's First Acquisition: How This Defense Startup is Revolutionizing Military Tech with AI

Kela Acquires AI Firm Pelanor in Multi-Million Dollar Deal

Defense startup Kela has completed its first acquisition with the purchase of Pelanor, an Israeli company that develops an AI-based platform to help organizations analyze cloud spending in real time and reduce costs through recommendations and automation. The acquisition is estimated at tens of millions of dollars.

Pelanor was founded in late 2022 by Unit 8200 alumni Matan Mates (CEO), Ido Kotler (CPO), and Yotam Tanay (CTO). Its system uses artificial intelligence to track the sources of changes in cloud expenses, automatically detect anomalies, and optimize resource allocation across customers, products, and projects. The company employs about 15 people.

Kela founders. (Photo: Kobi Keunkas)

Kela itself was founded in July 2024 and has raised about $100 million in under a year. It began with a $11 million Seed round led by Sequoia, followed by a $28 million Series A led by Lux Capital with participation from In-Q-Tel and other investors. A few months later, Kela expanded its funding with an additional $60 million from existing backers. The company currently employs 25 people.

Kela's founders include Hamutal Meridor, a graduate of Unit 8200, who previously managed Palantir’s Israeli operations, a company that develops combat management systems and has garnered significant interest since its IPO on Wall Street. In recent years, she was a partner at the Vintage investment fund.

Kela’s CEO is Alon Dror, a graduate of the Talpiot program who served for about a decade in the defense sector, first as tank commander and later in roles at the Directorate of Defence Research & Development where he was awarded the Israel Defense Prize.

Other co-founders include Jason Manne, an aeronautical engineer with a decade of experience in weapons development in the Israeli Air Force and the Intelligence Corps’ elite Technology Unit (Unit 81), and Omer Bar-Ilan, an experienced engineer and serial entrepreneur who previously led the algorithms team at Rafael.

Kela is building what it describes as an “operating system for militaries” - an open, modular platform designed to make military systems more dynamic and adaptable, in the same way civilian operating systems allow diverse applications to be integrated. The platform enables the rapid and secure connection of advanced commercial technologies, ranging from sensors and command-and-control systems to cyber tools and AI solutions, into existing military infrastructure. By collecting data from sources such as cameras, drones, and radars, processing it in real time, and presenting commanders with a unified situational picture, Kela aims to bridge the gap between fast-moving civilian innovation and the slower, more rigid processes of defense systems.

“Our strategy is to grow quickly, not just to meet demand, but to accelerate development and deliver capabilities at the pace that today’s reality requires,” said Hamutal Meridor, Kela’s president and co-founder. “The addition of the Pelanor team, among the brightest in Israel, is part of that effort: bringing in top talent who share our mission and vision to become the next great defense company for Israel and the West.”

Matan Mates, Pelanor’s CEO and co-founder, added: “We founded Pelanor out of a passion to solve hard and meaningful problems. When Kela approached us, it felt natural, we found a home where we could pursue our mission on a larger scale, alongside people who live and breathe a deep sense of purpose.”