Collibra just picked up data access startup Raito to boost its AI-driven data governance tools.
The Brussels-based governance platform announced the acquisition Thursday. Raito launched in 2021 and specializes in managing who can access internal data for employees and customers.
Financial details? Collibra declined to comment. Raito had raised $4 million from Dawn Capital, Crane Venture Partners, and Collibra itself. 
Collibra CEO Felix Van de Maele told TechCrunch the data access headache is growing with AI and workflow automation ramping up.
“We heard from our customers and large organizations that managing data access at scale has become a really big problem,” Van de Maele said.
“That’s why the traditional approaches just don’t scale anymore. They’re too brittle. They’re manual workflows, [based on] static policies.”
Collibra already offers similar capabilities via Collibra Protect, mainly focused on data privacy. Raito’s tech will ramp up automation and access controls.
Other players like SailPoint and SecureAuth operate here, but Van de Maele favored acquiring Raito for its cloud-native AI-ready platform.
“We also [were] looking for teams that want to continue to build, right? It’s not the end for this,” Van de Maele said.
“It is just really the beginning of this journey.”
This move fits a broader trend. Salesforce aims to buy Informatica. Alation and ServiceNow made deals this month too. AI growth is pushing companies to consolidate fragmented data governance tools.
“That fragmentation of governance . . .has really become a big problem, and so that’s why we were excited to kind of acquire Raito and really make it part of Collibra, our unified governance platform for data and AI,” Van de Maele added.
Founded in 2008, Collibra has raised nearly $600 million from heavy hitters like Index Ventures, Sequoia, and Tiger Global. Its clients include Heineken, Credit Suisse, and SAP.
