5 Companies That Came To Win This Week
For the week ending April 19, CRN takes a look at the companies that brought their ‘A’ game to the channel including Armis, Commvault, Confluent, Cisco Systems and Rubrik.
The Week Ending April 19
Topping this week’s Came to Win is cybersecurity unicorn Armis for a strategic acquisition that will expand the company’s technology portfolio and expertise in cybersecurity risk assessment and remediation.
Also making this week’s list is data management and protection software developer Commvault for its own savvy acquisition centered on cloud cyber resilience technology. Confluent makes this week’s list for a new partner program to help systems integrators work with the company’s streaming data technology, while Cisco Systems launched what it described as the most consequential security product in the company’s history. And data security provider Rubrik showed that it’s thinking big in terms of a target share price for its pending IPO.
Armis Acquires Risk Prioritization Startup Silk Security For $150M
Cybersecurity unicorn Armis this week acquired Silk Security, a startup focused on helping organizations prioritize their responses to cybersecurity risks. Armis said the acquisition had a $150 million price tag.
Armis plans to integrate Silk Security’s technology into its Centrix vulnerability management platform. That will assist with risk prioritization and remediation, according to Armis, and enable Armis to offer a “consolidated view of security findings,” leveraging data sources across on-premises systems, cloud environments, application security tools and software code.
The result is that Armis will now be able to “fully manage and automate remediation” for its users, the company said.
The acquisition is the second to date for Armis, which bought Cyber Threat Cognitive Intelligence in February. Cyber Threat Cognitive Intelligence, also a startup, focused on tracking real-world exploits of vulnerabilities.
Last year Armis said that its annual recurring revenue had surpassed $100 million, a key milestone for venture-backed companies aiming for an IPO.
Commvault Acquires Appranix In Cyber Resilience Move
Staying on the topic of strategic acquisitions, data management and protection software developer Commvault this week acquired Appranix, a provider of cloud cyber resilience technology.
With the technology it is gaining through the deal Commvault can help businesses reduce the time they need to recover from a cyberattack or system failure.
Appranix is the developer of the Cloud Resilience Copilot, which the company says goes beyond traditional backups and disaster recovery by delivering cloud recovery assurance for rebuilding cloud applications after a ransomware attack or system outage.
When there is a system failure or security breach, it’s not just recovering data that’s critical, Tim Zonca, Commvault portfolio marketing vice president, told CRN. Companies often spend days or weeks rebuilding distributed and dynamic cloud applications. Appranix’s patented technology automates the process of rebuilding cloud applications and can reduce the time it takes to do so to hours or minutes.
While Commvault already has cyber resilience built into its platform, Zonca said the Appranix acquisition will take that to a new level by helping Commvault deliver cyber resilience across an even wider spectrum spanning risk mitigation, readiness, rapid recovery, and rebuilding infrastructure.
Confluent Launches Revamped Program To Boost Service Opportunities For Systems Integrators
Data streaming technology developer Confluent wins applause this week for launching a revamped partner program to help systems integrators better develop and deliver solutions based on the Confluent platform and provide professional services around those solutions.
The expanded Accelerate with Confluent initiative offers resources and expertise to help systems integrators develop repeatable services and solutions around the Confluent data streaming platform and help customers realize value more quickly.
Given the complexities of real-time data streaming, systems integrators don’t always have the resources and expertise they need to bring data streaming to their applications and their customers without direct support from Confluent’s own professional services operations, according to the company.
The Accelerate with Confluent program, with its emphasis on expediting service repeatability and profitability, is designed to better support systems integrators with solution co-delivery, strategic staffing and the ability to work with customers to develop long-term data strategies, Paul Mac Farland, Confluent senior vice president of partner and innovation ecosystem, told CRN.
Confluent has been stepping up its channel initiatives in the last year. In July 2023 the company launched the Connect with Confluent program to assist developers of database, data analytics and other big data software build integrations with the Confluent data streaming platform. And in February of this year it debuted the Confluent Migration Accelerator program to assist partners – especially systems integrators – who help customers migrate to Confluent’s platform from legacy data streaming and messaging systems.
Cisco Systems made a big move in the security technology space this week, introducing Cisco Hypershield, software that the company is a new approach to security architecture and centers on securing data centers and clouds to protect AI workloads.
Cisco executives touted Hypershield as the “most consequential” security technology announcement in the company’s history. Cisco created the technology in response to the increasing demands that AI has put on IT infrastructure.
Hypershield, which is entirely software-based, is designed to protect applications, devices, and data across public and private data centers, clouds, and physical locations.
The new technology will solve common customer problems by offering distributed exploit protection, autonomous segmentation, and self-qualifying upgrades, which will save time for both partners and customers.
Rubrik Targets IPO Fundraise Of Up To $713M
Data security provider Rubrik signaled this week that it’s moving closer to an IPO with the disclosure that it’s aiming to raise up to $713 million in the proposed sales of shares in the company.
Rubrik would become the first cybersecurity company to go public in several years.
Earlier this month, Rubrik publicly filed its intentions for a planned IPO with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission, without sharing a target fundraise at the time. The company plans on being listed on the New York Stock Exchange under the symbol “RBRK.”
In an update to its SEC filing this week, Rubrik disclosed that it now plans to sell 23 million shares in the offering and expects to list the shares for between $28 and $31 a piece. That would constitute a range of between $644 million and $713 million raised in the Rubrik IPO.
At the top of the share price range Rubrik would be valued at $5.4 billion.