PANW vs ARM Comparison

Palo Alto Networks is a platform-based cybersecurity vendor with product offerings covering network security, cloud security, and security operations. The California-based firm has more than 80,000 enterprise customers across the world, including more than three-fourths of the Global 2000.

Arm Holdings is the IP owner and developer of the Arm architecture, which is used in 99% of the world's smartphone CPU cores. It also has high market share in other battery-powered devices like wearables, tablets, and sensors. Arm licenses its architecture for a fee, offering different types of licenses depending on the flexibility the customer needs. Customers like Apple or Qualcomm buy architectural licenses, which allow them to modify the architecture and add or delete instructions to tailor the chips to their specific needs. Other clients directly buy off-the-shelf designs from Arm. Both off-the-shelf and architectural customers pay a royalty fee per chip shipped. In 2026, Arm announced the launch of its own CPU products on top of its existing royalty business.