In a significant move that underscores the growing importance of automating the latter stages of software development, AI-powered software delivery platform Harness has secured $240 million in a Series E financing round.[1][2][3][4][5] The investment, led by Goldman Sachs Alternatives, elevates the San Francisco-based company's valuation to a staggering $5.5 billion.[1][2][6][7][8][9] This infusion of capital is earmarked for the advancement of its artificial intelligence capabilities, specifically "Harness AI," and to accelerate its global expansion, signaling a pivotal moment for the DevOps and AI industries.[1][2][5][10] The funding round also included participation from existing investors IVP, Menlo Ventures, and Unusual Ventures, and is comprised of a $200 million direct investment and a planned $40 million tender offer.[1][2][7][3][9]

The investment arrives as the software development landscape undergoes a radical transformation. While generative AI has dramatically accelerated the process of writing code, this has inadvertently created a significant bottleneck in the subsequent phases of the software development lifecycle.[1][6] Industry experts note that engineering teams typically spend only 30-40% of their time writing and iterating on code.[1][2][6] The majority of their effort, a critical 60-70%, is consumed by what is often termed the "outer loop"—the complex and traditionally manual processes of testing, deployment, security verification, compliance, and optimization.[1][2][6][4] The surge in AI-generated code is magnifying this disparity, creating a wider gap between rapid development and the safe, reliable delivery of software.[1][2] Harness positions itself as the solution to this mounting challenge, aiming to bring intelligence and automation to this entire "after-code" lifecycle.[1][2][6][8] As Harness co-founder and CEO Jyoti Bansal stated, "The next frontier for AI in software engineering is applying intelligence to the delivery process — testing, verification, deployments, governance, and everything that happens after code is written."[1][2][8][9]

At the heart of Harness's strategy is its flagship offering, Harness AI, a unified system purpose-built to manage and automate everything that happens after the initial code is written.[1] The platform is designed with three foundational layers to bring intelligent automation to software delivery.[1] These include a library of specialized AI agents built for specific tasks like delivery, testing, and security; a "Software Delivery Knowledge Graph" that maps the relationships between code changes, services, and deployments to provide unified context; and a reliable orchestration engine to ensure consistent AI automation across all workflows.[1][4] This intelligent system is designed to learn, adapt, and act on behalf of engineering teams, removing the toil of manual, repetitive work.[1][2][3][10] The goal is to transform the most complex and time-consuming parts of software delivery into streamlined, intelligent processes.[2][6] Harness has a history of integrating AI into its platform, having launched its AI Development Assistant, AIDA, to infuse AI across the entire software development lifecycle, from resolving deployment failures to automatically fixing security vulnerabilities.[11][12][13][14][15]

The substantial funding and new valuation reflect strong market confidence in Harness's vision and execution. "AI has shifted the bottleneck from writing code to delivering it, and Harness is solving that problem at enterprise scale," said Beat Cabiallavetta, a Partner at Goldman Sachs Alternatives.[2] He added that Harness's unified platform, combining AI, context, governance, and security, is resonating with organizations redesigning their engineering systems for the AI era.[2] The company's growth trajectory supports this sentiment, with projections to exceed $250 million in annual recurring revenue in 2025, representing over 50% year-over-year growth.[1][5] Harness serves over 1,000 enterprise engineering teams, including major companies like United Airlines, Morningstar, and National Australia Bank, which have reported significant improvements in deployment frequency and efficiency.[1][2][5][16] For instance, United Airlines accelerated deployment times by 75%, and Morningstar achieved 5x faster builds.[2] With a global team of over 1,200 employees, the company has demonstrated significant scale, powering 128 million deployments and optimizing $1.9 billion in cloud spending for its customers over the last year.[1][5][16]

Looking forward, Harness is poised to solidify its position as a critical enabler of the AI-driven software economy. The Series E funding will not only fuel platform innovation but also support an expansion of its global footprint, including plans to hire hundreds of new engineers for its hub in Bengaluru, India.[1][10][17][16] CEO Jyoti Bansal, a serial entrepreneur who previously sold AppDynamics to Cisco for $3.7 billion, has indicated that taking Harness public is a long-term goal.[18] The company's recent merger with Traceable, an API security firm also co-founded by Bansal, further strengthens its security offerings within the DevOps lifecycle.[6][17] As the volume of AI-generated code continues to explode, the demand for intelligent, automated, and secure software delivery platforms is set to intensify. Harness, now armed with significant new capital and a robust valuation, is strategically positioned to lead this next chapter of software engineering, focusing on the critical, complex, and value-rich domain of everything that happens after the code is written.