Not surprisingly, the core of the Altiris product set, which covers provisioning and software deployment to client PCs, remains largely intact. But the deal, which brought Altiris into a larger company that has specialized in PC LAN and desktop security, also brought with it some product overlaps. They included the Ghost imaging, pcAnywhere remote control, and the LiveState Delivery software distribution.
Going forward, the venerable Ghost and pcAnywhere technologies will replace Altiris’ image format and Carbon Copy products, respectively. But LiveState Delivery, which largely stagnated under Symantec’s watch following the 2003 acquisition of ON Technologies, will be phased out in favor of what is essentially the heart of the Altiris product line.
Symantec has released an update to the Altiris Deployment suite that includes the Ghost image format as its initial step towards integrating the product set. Although it will provide migration paths for existing Altiris customers, it’s not pulling the plug on the PC client imaging technology as it is currently OEM’ed by HP and dell.
By contrast, while Altiris’ Carbon Copy product is over 20 years old, it was not core to the software deployment suite that became the mainstay of its business. Consequently, replacing it with pcAnywhere, which has been a better-known brand, was hardly surprising.
Since the acquisition, Symantec has preserved Altiris’ identity and, excluding minor redundancies of a couple dozen back office staff, has kept the 1000-person organization largely intact and recruited roughly 75 new hires. It’s also kept the Altiris brand name and website, placing the unit in charge of endpoint systems (client) management.
According to Greg Butterfield, who continues to head the Altiris business unit under Symantec, , there will be future crosscuts that blend pieces of Symantec Norton and related client security products with Altiris offerings.
For instance, while Norton Antivirus is obviously going to remain a Symantec brand, linkages will be made to Altiris’ asset management tools that track which clients have received updates, and which have not. That’s obviously a serious issue for any organization with laptops that aren’t always connected when an upgrade or patch deployment happens. This offering will be released before year end.
Butterfield is also looking at Symantec compliance-related products that have garnered presence in larger organizations to see if they could be more effectively repackaged for the midsize customers that are the sweet spot of the Altiris base. And, while Butterfield says that there’s been no channel conflict between the Altiris and Symantec organizations, he’s looking for cross-selling opportunities, and especially, how to use Symantec’s channels to increase Altiris sales outside North America.
