2025: The year everything changed (and nothing did)

2025 has been the most intense year in KrakenD’s history. Not because things went wrong. Quite the opposite. This was the year when the work we’ve been putting in since 2016 finally crystallized into something bigger.

We joined a global software group. We welcomed 40 new enterprise customers. We shipped native AI Gateway capabilities. We got SOC 2 Type II certified. And we did all of this while staying exactly who we are.

Here’s how it happened.

We got acquired. On our own terms.

KrakenD has been profitable since day one. We incorporated in 2021, but the project started back in 2016, and we never needed external money to exist. That changes the nature of every investor conversation. When you’re not desperate, you can be picky.

Over the years, we had plenty of conversations with potential investors and acquirers. Some interesting, most not. But early 2025 brought a qualitatively different kind of conversation. For the first time, an acquisition started to make real sense.

Here’s the thing. When you don’t need to sell, the bar becomes incredibly high. It has to be worth it. For the team. For the product. For our customers. For the future of what we’re building.

Shop Circle understood that from day one. They weren’t looking to absorb us into some corporate machine. They wanted KrakenD to remain KrakenD: same team, same people, same vision, same way of doing things. What they offered was fuel, not a takeover.

In August, we made it official.

The entire team stayed. Our roadmap didn’t change. Our independence remained intact. What changed is that we now have resources to move faster, reach further, and execute on opportunities we couldn’t tackle alone.

Was the process exhausting? Absolutely. Running a full M&A process (due diligence, negotiations, legal, the works) while simultaneously going through SOC 2 Type II certification, with a team of seven people, in the same semester… not something we’d recommend for your health. But we pulled it off without dropping a single ball.

Looking back, we’re proud of how we handled it. Not because it was easy, but because we did it right.

From API Gateway to AI Gateway

Here’s something funny: we started 2025 selling an API Gateway. We’re ending it selling AI Governance.

Same product. Completely different narrative.

When the AI wave started building momentum, we didn’t panic or pivot. We realized that what we’d been building for years (a gateway that understands business logic, aggregates services, transforms protocols, and enforces policies) was exactly what organizations would need to govern their AI infrastructure.

The timing was right. MCP (Model Context Protocol) emerged as the standard for how AI agents communicate with services. And in October, we released KrakenD v2.12 with native MCP Server support: the ability to turn any service (REST, gRPC, SOAP, Lambda, you name it) into tools that AI agents can consume.

Not a proxy. Not a wrapper. A full MCP Server, with all the gateway capabilities you’d expect: rate limiting, authentication, observability, security policies. Built in.

While other API Gateways are scrambling to figure out how to bolt on MCP support, it came naturally to us. We’ve always been more than a proxy. Now the market needs exactly that.

And then there’s Shadow AI. Employees using AI tools without IT’s knowledge or approval. It’s the new Shadow IT, except faster, less visible, and potentially more dangerous. KrakenD gives organizations visibility and control over which APIs their AI agents can access, under what conditions, and with what guardrails.

We didn’t become an AI company. We became the company that helps you govern AI safely. There’s a difference.

The numbers

Some facts, no fluff:

• 40 new enterprise customers joined KrakenD this year
• We now have presence in more than 30 countries
• Over 3 million servers run KrakenD every month worldwide
• We achieved SOC 2 Type II certification in June
• Our partner network keeps expanding across continents

These aren’t vanity metrics. They’re proof that what we’re building matters to organizations that don’t tolerate bullshit.

The team grows (but stays small)

One thing that hasn’t changed: we’re still a small, dense team. No layers. No bureaucracy. Everyone ships.

This year we welcomed:

• Jorge on the engineering side
• Toni on sales

And in January 2026, we’re adding:

• Rute in finance
• Narcís in engineering
• …with more to come

We grow deliberately. Every person we add has to make the team stronger, not just bigger. That philosophy isn’t changing.

Looking ahead

2026 is going to be interesting.

MCP is consolidating as the industry standard for AI-to-service communication. Organizations are waking up to the fact that AI governance isn’t optional. The regulatory pressure around AI (hello, EU AI Act) will only increase.

We’re positioned exactly where we want to be: at the intersection of API infrastructure and AI governance, with a product that’s ready, a team that executes, and now the resources to scale.

We’re not chasing hype. We’re solving real problems for organizations that need to move fast without losing control.

Thank you

To our customers: thank you for trusting us with your infrastructure. We don’t take that lightly.

To the open-source community: we’re still yours. The core of KrakenD remains open, governed by the Linux Foundation, and we’re committed to keeping it that way.

To our team: you’re the reason any of this works.

To Shop Circle: thank you for understanding how we operate and letting us keep doing it.

2025 was the year everything changed. And somehow, nothing did.

Here’s to 2026.