Oasis Aims For Partner Push To Enable ‘Next Wave’ Of Identity Security: President Michael DeCesare

In an interview with CRN, the longtime cybersecurity executive says Oasis Security is seeking to scale through the channel as AI agents turn non-human identity security into a top business priority.

Oasis Security is focusing aggressively on partner-driven growth amid massive opportunities in non-human identity security, spurred by the rapid adoption of AI agents, according to Oasis Security President Michael DeCesare.

In an interview with CRN, the longtime cybersecurity executive said that when it comes to solution and service providers, “we want to partner with anybody that wants to partner deeply with us.”

DeCesare joined four-year-old Oasis Security in late April as the venture-backed company looks to disrupt a key sector of cybersecurity that, in his words, has “gotten a little stale.”

At this point, “there are a lot of customers that see that—and are very actively trying to explore what the next generation of identity offerings is,” he said.

Oasis Security is finding major growth with its capabilities for discovering and securing non-human identities, including those created by AI agents, and is seeking to accelerate its expansion through the channel, DeCesare said.

In March, Oasis announced raising a $120 million Series B funding round led by Craft Ventures, bringing the company to a total of $195 million in funding since its launch in 2022. Then in April, the company unveiled its new channel program under the leadership of Sam Hahm, Americas channel and alliances leader at Oasis Security.

DeCesare said that while some solution providers may gravitate toward the bigger names in identity security, “the more time they spend with a company like Oasis, the more they’re going to realize that this is the next wave of where the identity market is going.”

Partner Perspective

Without a doubt, Oasis has stood out in the identity security market through its highly differentiated approach to visibility for non-human identity (NHI) as well as AI governance, according to Cyderes’ James Hauswirth.

Oasis is “very clearly the front-runner in NHI. They have been pretty much since they came out of stealth,” said Hauswirth, global managing director for privileged access management at Kansas City, Mo.-based Cyderes, No. 98 on CRN’s Solution Provider 500 for 2025.

Historically, a huge challenge with NHI has been around understanding how a non-human identity is being used—and by whom—before the efforts are made to bring it under management, he said.

Oasis has addressed the issue with technology that can rapidly evaluate the context around NHI, including how the credentials are actually being utilized—while also assessing whether they are being used by a human user, a machine process or an AI system, Hauswirth said.

In the past, “I was in the trenches trying to solve these problems manually,” he said. “The data that Oasis can display within a few hours is something that used to take months to get.”

Another major advantage for Oasis is that the platform is geared toward addressing not only longstanding NHI challenges, but also emerging AI governance needs, Hauswirth noted.

“Oasis is purpose-built to solve for both your general, technical debt version of non-human identity, but also AI governance,” Hauswirth said.

Ultimately, “Oasis solves the problem in a unique, scalable way that is deeply valuable to clients,” he said.

Channel-Focused Growth

DeCesare said that Oasis is driving most of its deals through the channel and is seeking to work closely with more partners as the company looks to scale up.

“I’m a very channel-friendly person. There has to be a really strong reason not to go through a channel partner for us,” he said.

DeCesare formerly served as president of McAfee from 2011 to 2015, before going on to spend nearly six years as CEO of Forescout. Subsequent roles included serving as president and CEO of Exabeam and, most recently, as president at Abnormal AI.

For Oasis Security, the channel opportunity is less about generating leads and more about helping customers navigate the fast-moving space of NHI and AI agent access, DeCesare noted.

That role is becoming more essential for solution providers as organizations move quickly to deploy AI agents, even as they are still in the process of understanding the security implications, he said.

The opportunity is undoubtedly still early but growing fast—and is on track to deliver a massive boost to channel business going forward, according to DeCesare.

The bottom line for Oasis, he said: “We’re looking for deep, trusting relationships with partners that want to build businesses around us, the same way we want to build businesses around them.”