Palo Alto, California-based PGP’s encryption product started life on the desktop, where there are today some 30,000 users worldwide, according to its VP of marketing Andrew Krcik.

The thrust of its model now is to grow the server business it entered with the launch of the PGP Universal Server in September 2003, for which it currently has some 1,200 corporate customers worldwide.

This is not server-based encryption, however, as that function remains on the desktop, the server rather enabling customers to centrally manage all the desktop clients in their organizations, while for PGP itself it represents the opportunity to upsell with more apps on the same platform.

PGP NetShare is a case in point, It enables files going onto a network file server to be encrypted from the desktop and held in that format, with decrypted access being restricted to a list of approved individuals defined either centrally or, if the sys admin has granted the right, by the original end user who created the file.

The core products for which a new release is coming out, then, are PGP Universal and PGP Desktop, with the new iteration being v2.5. Another important addition besides the NetShare capability is the ability to federate key information, potentially among all PGP users around the world, via a new Global Directory.

When a new Desktop client is being set up, it will offer the user the option of putting their key onto an open key server and associating it with their email address, Krcik said. You can then instruct the client to always consult that Global Directory and search by email address.

Aside from that, other additions in v2.5 are mainly responses to requests from the user base, such as SSO integration for the Whole Disk Encryption app and MacOS support.

On the financial front, PGP is feeling sufficiently please with itself to go public with the information that over the last four years we’ve done $100m of cumulative revenue, $40m of which over the last 12 months, Krcik revealed.

This is clearly a response to major corporate customers and target customers expressing concern at the lack of transparency inherent in operating as a private company.