EMC Folds In Network Management With Voyence Buy

The acquisition, unveiled Tuesday morning, meshes with EMC's December 2004 $260 million acquisition of Smarts, which developed software to analyze and present logical possible actions to problems in a network.

Voyence, Richardson, Texas, has a strong position in the network change and configuration management space, said Bob Quillin, senior director of product marketing in EMC's Resource Management Software Group, which also includes such software as EMC Control Center, Storage Resource Manager, and Smarts.

Compliance is a significant part of the Voyence acquisition, Quillin said. Voyence's software works with the IT Infrastructure Library (ITIL), an initiative that makes sure that a company's network policies are applied in a disciplined level, he said.

That makes Voyence a very pro-active application in terms of policies related to regulatory or compliance considerations like Sarbanes-Oxley, and ensuring the network remains in compliance with those policies, he said. "It's all about how to make sure the company stays compliant, detecting drifts away from policies, and how to bring it back into compliance," he said.

For example, he said Voyence can be used to make sure that all network devices are set up according to a company's security policy. "It can help make sure hackers can't hack into wireless routers and get into the system," he said. "It can be used to show regulatory authorities and others that the network complies with policies. You can then do things like run an audit to see if a patch update left any holes in security."

The Voyence software also has a nice, consistent connect point with Smarts, Quillin said. The two had a technology relationship for years, so they are already integrated, letting EMC get value from the acquisition almost immediately, he said.

"When the Voyence software detects a change in the network, it can send an alert to the Smarts software that the change was recorded," he said. "So when Smarts is trying to service the network, and sees a change in the configuration, it can tell Voyence to make the changes needed to get back into compliance."

Analyst firm Robert W. Baird said in a written opinion that the acquisition of Voyence is consistent with EMC's software and services strategy.

"The Voyence solutions allows companies to manage thousands of network-based devices for compliance, serviceability and security-related demands," wrote Daniel Renouard, an analyst at Baird. "We believe PCI compliance is a key demand driver of the Voyence solution."

Financial details of the acquisition were not released.