Trend Micro, which is best known for its anti-virus software but is also present in a variety of areas, joins several of its peers in acquiring a DLP vendor. McAfee bought Onigma, as well as endpoint security vendor SafeBoot, while Websense acquired PortAuthority. Even RSA, which is primarily a core rather than edge security player, entered the fray in August with the acquisition of Tablus. The 800lb gorilla in AV, Symantec, is the subject of persistent rumors in connection with the best known DLP player Vontu, a putative deal said to have a price tag of between $300m and $350m. Check Point is also mulling how to approach this market.
Provilla, which is headquartered in Mountain View, California, claims that its technology is differentiated by being endpoint-centric. Its LeakProof agents sit on endpoint like laptops and uses patented fingerprinting technology called DataDNA to detect when an attempt is underway to send sensitive data and/or intellectual property out of a company’s network.
Shu Huang, Provilla’s founder and CTO, said the agent currently works on Microsoft’s desktop and laptop OSes, but said there are plans to extend it to cellphone and PDA platforms, starting with the Windows Mobile OS.
He said that in this context the fact that the agent was designed from scratch to be a small-footprint client, rather than being cut down to fit as happened with technologies that started on the gateway, should stand Trend/Provilla in good stead in this space, given the space constraints in sub-laptop devices.
Trend did not reveal the value of the acquisition, but it is likely to have been relatively small because Provilla is still a start-up. It was founded in February 2005 with the LeakProof offering comprising the agent. A management server was launched a year ago. Since then, according to Glen Kosaka, its VP of marketing, it has signed up over 12 customers and distribution partners.
These include Sony Ericsson on the customer side, and OEMs including BigFix and Reconnex. Hitachi Systems is also reselling LeakProof in Japan, and Trend said it intends to maintain all these relationships.
Our View
The M&A activity that’s already happened, as well as the deals rumored to be underway, indicates how DLP is the flavor of the month right now. Trend has bought technology rather than a customer base, and one of the main attractions as a Japanese company is the fact that LeakProof supports the double-byte Asian languages like Japanese and Chinese out of the box.
However, technology on the endpoint alone is not enough, so Trend and Provilla will need to get their skates on to develop a gateway offering too.
