A CA executive confirmed that the deal means that CA will stop OEMing Check Point Software Technologies Ltd’s ZoneAlarm firewall, though probably not for another six to 12 months.
The acquisition of Tiny is focused on providing hardened endpoint security, rather than compete with the company’s perimeter firewall partners such as Check Point, according to CA’s VP of security strategy, Simon Perry.
With the enterprise space its individual endpoint hardening, rather than huge big firewalls. They’ll have the big firewalls for the whole of IT, it’s used to secure an individual machine, Perry told ComputerWire, adding that Tiny did not compete directly with enterprise firewall vendors, and CA would not do so.
Instead it is adding the Tiny Firewall to its eTrust Integrated Threat Management software portfolio, alongside its anti-virus and intrusion control software, as well as the anti-spyware technology it acquired with PestPatrol Inc in August 2004.
The Tiny Firewall technology will continue to be sold standalone directly and through the existing Tiny channel partners, and will over time be integrated with the rest of the Integrated Threat Management products with a common agent, front-end, management, and updates.
We made the Tiny acquisition for the intrusion prevention, which was seen as a weakness for us, CA’s VP of eTrust security management, Sam Curry, said. We really needed to have it [the technology] in-house.
CA has been OEMing ZoneAlarm, Check Point’s popular personal firewall software, for a few years, building it into the eTrust antivirus and security suite. Curry confirmed that the ZoneAlarm deal will eventually be allowed to end.
We have a great partnership with Zone. In the short term, nothing changes, but over the longer term we will use Tiny as the core engine, Curry said. Longer term means six to 12 months, he guessed.
The Tiny technology is available for both individuals/small businesses and enterprise businesses and is designed to protect Microsoft Windows-based hosts. Santa Clara, California-based Tiny employed 12 people, all engineers, who have transferred to CA.
The purchase of Tiny is the latest in a number of acquisitions CA has made in recent months to fill specific gaps in its product portfolio. After PestPatrol it acquired access control and user provisioning software vendor Netegrity Inc in October 2004.
That was followed by the purchase of network management vendor Concord Communications Inc in April, and most recently corporate governance software vendor Niku Corp, earlier this month.
The acquisitions have helped CA to focus its attention on moving away from the corporate scandals that rocked the company during 2004, something that was also behind its consideration of a change of identity, according to a Reuters report that stated the company was considering formally changing its name to CA.
The report quoted CA’s chief marketing officer Don Friedman as saying: I can see this as the first baby step. We are going to change the conversations and the perception of CA.
ComputerWire understands that the company has opted against the name change, however, after research among its customer base indicated that they have not been put off by the scandals coming to light.
In 2004 the company admitted that its employees cooked the books in its fiscal 2000 by keeping sales accounts open after legal reporting periods had ended. The practice, known as the 35-day month, led to $2.2bn being incorrectly accounted for.
Former CEO Sanjay Kumar is currently facing charges of conspiracy to commit securities fraud and obstruction of justice, and could be sentenced to up to 100 years in jail if convicted on all counts.
At the end of May, CA once again announced it would have to revise its revenue and income statements for the last four years, after uncovering yet more questionable contracts during a period when its senior executives are suspected to have been cooking the books.
