Geniez AI acquired by Rocket Software

source: news (news:blocksandfiles)published 2026-10-19 12:42ingested 2026-10-20 02:50

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DATA MANAGEMENT Geniez AI acquired by Rocket Software Model9 mainframe VTL founder Gil Peleg has sold a second mainframe utility, the Geniez AI management tool, to an acquirer. Israeli startup Model9, co-founded in 2016 by CEO Gil Peleg, an ex-IBM SW engineer, and two others, replaced complex, slow and costly mainframe tape backup storage with Virtual Tape lIbrary (VTL) software sending data to public cloud object storage and S3-supporting on-premises stores. It was bought by BMC in 2023. Peleg and the team joined BMC, but he and ex-Model9 CRO Dan Shprung left in September 2025 to startup Geniez AI and develop software to connect AI Large Language Models and agents with mainframes and extract real-time data for AI use. Just over a year later it’s been sold to Rocket Software, in what looks like rocket-level progress. Milan Shetti, president and CEO of Rocket Software, said: “This is about continuing to transform what is possible on the mainframe. By bringing Geniez AI’s specialized expertise into Rocket, we are accelerating our vision to help enterprises securely apply agentic AI to their systems with speed, confidence, and control.” Shetti is an ex-SVP And GM for HPE’s storage and big data business unit, joining Rocket in 2021 as a resident for its z mainframe unit. Rocket Software is an IBM mainframe and i/Power-focussed IT modernization supplier and is owned by Bain Capital. It has, it says, a strong and long-standing partnership with IBM. Geniez says its AI Framework augments mainframe teams with expert AI agents operating directly on the mainframe in every domain, monitoring live systems, diagnosing incidents, remediating security vulnerabilities and executing agentic workflows using natural language. It requires no prerequisites and installs in hours. When started up, Geniez AI said it was opening up mainframe’s data storage for real-time use by non-IBM LLMs and agents. At that time Peleg told B&F: “We’re going to bring GenAI to the mainframe just like in Model9 we brought object storage to the mainframe.” Peleg, now SVP, SoftwareEngineering at Rocket, said: ”Geniez AI was founded on the belief that GenAI-based business applications can fundamentally change how enterprises understand and operate their mainframe environments. Joining Rocket gives us the scale, customer reach, and deep mainframe expertise to bring that vision to more organizations and help shape the next era of intelligent, mission-critical operations.” Rocket gains Geniez AI’s technology and six employees, and they will help accelerate Rocket’s AI initiatives, particularly Rocket EVA, the company’s agentic AI platform for core systems, giving it new capabilities. Rocket Software and the Geniez AI team are working, Rocket says, to shift traditional, expertise-intensive mainframe management to intelligent, AI-assisted operations that make core systems easier to understand, manage, and modernize. In other words, using natural language to manage the mainframe instead of complicated command line interfaces. Rocket wants to help mainframe customers apply AI agents that can reveal system insights, support action, and automate mission-critical workflows, with appropriate governance and control of course. Geniez AI gives it expanded agentic AI capabilities, particularly we suspect in the data sources access area. The acquisition cost was not revealed. Geniez raised $6 million in a 2025 seed round, and Israeli outlet Calacalist estimates the deal value could be up to $100 million. That seems high to us. Will Gil Peleg do it a third time; bring new technology to mainframe users? For him, thus far, the mainframe is the gift that has not stopped giving. Bootnote A Geniez AI blog says: "Core system data that typically resides on mainframes is different. It is authoritative, highly structured, and often spans years of operational history. This data captures real customer behavior, financial movement, entitlements, and transactions. These signals matter most for prediction and decision-making." And: "Historically, core system data has been consumed in batches hours or even days after events occurred. For traditional reporting, this was acceptable. For modern AI, it is not. … Without real-time access, GenAI models operate on a lagging view of reality, forcing teams to compensate with heuristics, thresholds, or conservative assumptions." Geniez AI provides real-tine access to that data.

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DATA MANAGEMENT
Geniez AI acquired by Rocket Software
Model9 mainframe VTL founder Gil Peleg has sold a second mainframe utility, the Geniez AI management tool, to an acquirer.
Israeli startup Model9, co-founded in 2016 by CEO Gil Peleg, an ex-IBM SW engineer, and two others, replaced complex, slow and costly mainframe tape backup storage with Virtual Tape lIbrary (VTL) software sending data to public cloud object storage and S3-supporting on-premises stores. It was bought by BMC in 2023. Peleg and the team joined BMC, but he and ex-Model9 CRO Dan Shprung left in September 2025 to startup Geniez AI and develop software to connect AI Large Language Models and agents with mainframes and extract real-time data for AI use. Just over a year later it’s been sold to Rocket Software, in what looks like rocket-level progress.
Milan Shetti, president and CEO of Rocket Software, said: “This is about continuing to transform what is possible on the mainframe. By bringing Geniez AI’s specialized expertise into Rocket, we are accelerating our vision to help enterprises securely apply agentic AI to their systems with speed, confidence, and control.” Shetti is an ex-SVP And GM for HPE’s storage and big data business unit, joining Rocket in 2021 as a resident for its z mainframe unit.
Rocket Software is an IBM mainframe and i/Power-focussed IT modernization supplier and is owned by Bain Capital. It has, it says, a strong and long-standing partnership with IBM. Geniez says its AI Framework augments mainframe teams with expert AI agents operating directly on the mainframe in every domain, monitoring live systems, diagnosing incidents, remediating security vulnerabilities and executing agentic workflows using natural language. It requires no prerequisites and installs in hours.
When started up, Geniez AI said it was opening up mainframe’s data storage for real-time use by non-IBM LLMs and agents. At that time Peleg told B&F: “We’re going to bring GenAI to the mainframe just like in Model9 we brought object storage to the mainframe.”
Peleg, now SVP, SoftwareEngineering at Rocket, said: ”Geniez AI was founded on the belief that GenAI-based business applications can fundamentally change how enterprises understand and operate their mainframe environments. Joining Rocket gives us the scale, customer reach, and deep mainframe expertise to bring that vision to more organizations and help shape the next era of intelligent, mission-critical operations.”
Rocket gains Geniez AI’s technology and six employees, and they will help accelerate Rocket’s AI initiatives, particularly Rocket EVA, the company’s agentic AI platform for core systems, giving it new capabilities. Rocket Software and the Geniez AI team are working, Rocket says, to shift traditional, expertise-intensive mainframe management to intelligent, AI-assisted operations that make core systems easier to understand, manage, and modernize.
In other words, using natural language to manage the mainframe instead of complicated command line interfaces. Rocket wants to help mainframe customers apply AI agents that can reveal system insights, support action, and automate mission-critical workflows, with appropriate governance and control of course. Geniez AI gives it expanded agentic AI capabilities, particularly we suspect in the data sources access area.
The acquisition cost was not revealed. Geniez raised $6 million in a 2025 seed round, and Israeli outlet Calacalist estimates the deal value could be up to $100 million. That seems high to us.
Will Gil Peleg do it a third time; bring new technology to mainframe users? For him, thus far, the mainframe is the gift that has not stopped giving.
Bootnote
A Geniez AI blog says: "Core system data that typically resides on mainframes is different. It is authoritative, highly structured, and often spans years of operational history. This data captures real customer behavior, financial movement, entitlements, and transactions. These signals matter most for prediction and decision-making."
And: "Historically, core system data has been consumed in batches hours or even days after events occurred. For traditional reporting, this was acceptable. For modern AI, it is not. … Without real-time access, GenAI models operate on a lagging view of reality, forcing teams to compensate with heuristics, thresholds, or conservative assumptions."
Geniez AI provides real-time access to that data.