F5 acquires MantisNet to enhance cloud-native observability in the F5 Application Delivery and Security Platform
F5 has acquired MantisNet, a recognized innovator in cloud-native, extended Berkeley Packet Filer (eBPF)-powered observability and real-time network intelligence. When integrated into the F5 Application Delivery and Security Platform (ADSP), MantisNet capabilities will enable organizations of all kinds, from telecom operators and enterprises to public sector agencies and cloud and managed service providers, to confidently transition to cloud-native architectures while maintaining deep operational visibility, automation, and security.
Organizations are rapidly shifting to cloud-native technologies like Kubernetes to unlock greater agility, scalability, and operational efficiency. With this transition, cloud-native network functions (CNFs) have emerged as a powerful way to modernize operations. By enabling rapid deployment, elastic scalability, platform independence, and seamless DevOps integration, CNFs offer unmatched flexibility and resilience for today’s dynamic digital landscapes. However, these benefits come with challenges, particularly in monitoring and securing ephemeral, encrypted traffic within containerized environments. Traditional monitoring tools aren’t built to track the transient and encrypted nature of container traffic.
This is precisely where MantisNet delivers game-changing value. Leveraging eBPF-powered kernel-level telemetry, MantisNet provides real-time insights into encrypted protocol activity, allowing organizations to gain visibility into even the most elusive traffic, all without performance overhead. With MantisNet, visibility gaps are closed, enabling enterprises to confidently adopt modern architectures without sacrificing control or security.
Traditional tools are like street-corner cameras; they capture activity, but only in limited areas and with blind spots. MantisNet works more like an intelligent satellite or a smart system built directly into the roads. It tracks every vehicle, monitors traffic patterns, detects even subtle changes, and streams rich, actionable data straight to your dashboard, without the need to juggle multiple camera feeds or cross-check data from different sources.
A smarter path to cloud-native policy, security, and scale
At the core of MantisNet’s innovation is its Containerized Visibility Fabric (CVF)—a lightweight and highly scalable solution tailored for dynamic workloads. Offering kernel-level insights, real-time telemetry, and visibility into encrypted traffic, CVF eliminates the need for sidecars or agents, ensuring high performance even in the most dynamic environments, particularly within cloud-native or 5G environments. By integrating MantisNet’s capabilities into cloud-native solutions like F5 BIG-IP Next for Kubernetes, and CNFs such as BIG-IP DNS, F5 BIG-IP Advanced Firewall Manager (AFM), F5 BIG-IP Policy Enforcement Manager (PEM), and BIG-IP Carrier-Grade Network Address Translation (CGNAT), F5 is set to deliver unparalleled observability across user, control, and application planes for industries ranging from telecom and 5G to enterprise and government.
MantisNet’s low-latency telemetry combined with F5 ADSP’s CNFs, policy engines, and analytics, give IT teams a powerful and adaptive automation fabric. With MantisNet, F5 will enable customers to:
- Gain visibility into encrypted sessions, including metadata and pre-encryption context from TLS 1.3.
- Automate policy enforcement by routing real-time insights directly into BIG-IP PEM or BIG-IP AFM for immediate action.
- Meet compliance needs through programmatic packet capture and historical flow retention.
- Secure east-west traffic inside containers, traffic that legacy tools typically overlook.
MantisNet gives you real-time, deep insight into your network traffic, especially in complex cloud-native, virtualized, or 5G setups so that you can monitor, analyze, and respond faster.
This unified stack with F5 ADSP reduces operational complexity, enhances detection speeds, and empowers organizations to roll out differentiated services faster and more securely, whether for 5G, internal apps, customer-facing platforms, or multi-tenant environments.
Looking ahead
This acquisition expands the value of F5 ADSP, offering a comprehensive platform to deploy, observe, and secure applications and networks across telco, enterprise, and government domains.
By embedding visibility deep into the stack and tying it to enforcement and analytics, customers across industries gain a complete, automated pipeline from insight to action. Including:
- Faster deployment and scaling of next-generation services
- Full-stack observability across containerized environments
- Security for traffic traditionally hidden from view
With F5 ADSP and MantisNet, customers will get the agility of cloud-native capabilities with the confidence of full-stack visibility—all in a single platform.
Interested in learning more about MantisNet or testing in your environment? Contact us.