McAfee to acquire Solidcore Systems

BENGALURU, INDIA: McAfee announced a definitive agreement to acquire privately-owned Solidcore Systems for approximately $33 million in cash up front and with an earn-out of up to an additional $14 million if certain performance targets are met. Solidcore is a provider of whitelisting technology that controls and protects the applications installed on a computer, resulting in improved IT compliance, security and availability.

“Solidcore’s industry-leading compliance and protection solutions will extend the current McAfee security portfolio beyond signature-based anti-malware with the addition of dynamic whitelisting and application trust technology,” said Dave DeWalt, President and CEO, McAfee.

“Combined with leading McAfee anti-virus, anti-spyware, host intrusion prevention, policy auditing and firewall technologies, we will help customers more easily mitigate the risks associated with vulnerable or malicious applications downloaded by employees. Through this acquisition, we believe McAfee can expand its reach into new markets, secure new platforms and strengthen its hold as the leader in the $6 billion endpoint security market.”

“Today’s complex threat landscape and evolving compliance standards require customers to go beyond a reactive, ‘check-the-box’ model for security and deploy preventive security that incorporates dynamic whitelisting,” said Anne Bonaparte, President and CEO, Solidcore.

 “The integration of Solidcore with McAfee will provide customers with the highest level of system integrity and security across their physical and virtual environments, and allow customers to more quickly and easily meet the today’s demanding compliance requirements.”

Following the closing, the Solidcore team will be incorporated into the McAfee's risk and compliance business unit, headed by George Kurtz, Senior VP and GM, McAfee. The acquisition is expected to close in the second quarter of 2009.