Blue Coat To Acquire URL Filtering Provider

The acquisition, expected to close in the next 60 days, will result in the integration of Cerberian's Web Manager URL filtering and categorization technology onto the Blue Coat ProxySG appliance.

According to Brian NeSmith, president and CEO of Sunnyvale, Calif.-based Blue Coat, the acquisition will boost Blue Coat's content filtering and protocol control capabilities, providing customers with comprehensive Web control.

"Customers today experience enhanced Web control, authentication and performance benefits by integrating URL filtering onto our ProxySG appliances," he said. "Integrating the Cerberian database with our proxy appliance is a strategic component that will strengthen Blue Coat's competitive position in the industry and allow us to grow the sales of our proxy appliances more rapidly."

As NeSmith explained, technology from Draper, Utah-based Cerberian also will complement Blue Coat's existing "on-proxy" support for URL filtering offerings from Secure Computing, SurfControl and Websense, giving customers the flexibility to choose among each of these databases.

As part of the announcement, Blue Coat is offering an OEM version of Cerberian's Web Manager running on the ProxySG. The OEM tool provides resellers with an additional option for selling high-performance URL filtering, and is a taste of what the fully integrated technologies can do.

Pricing for the OEM version ranges from about $4 to $25 per user for a one-year subscription. According to market-research firm IDC, the market for Web filtering is the second-fastest-growing segment of the secure content management market, and is projected to increase from $364 million in 2003 to $893 million in 2007.