With an eye to security in the cloud, SafeNet this week announced the acquisition of Cryptocard, an Ottawa-based provider of cloud-based authentication solutions. Financial terms of the transaction were not disclosed.
Based in Baltimore, Md., SafeNet is a security vendor focused primarily on data protection and access control with on-premise solutions. Tsion Gonen, chief strategy and marketing officer at SafeNet, said its approach isn’t around intrusion prevention but rather controlling access and protecting data, and what happens after a breach occurs.
Safenet’s offerings have been focused around on-premise solutions, and Gonen said with Cryptocard’s technology it will be able to offer customers seamless access control and user authentication services whether its on-premise, or in the cloud through an “as a service” delivery model.
“We strongly believe in the cloud changing how people consume security, and the cloud also represents new challenges for security,” said Gonen. “Cryptocard will be part of our bigger authentication story. More than anything else, it’s the as a service authentication capability and technology platform.”
SafeNet has 1,564 employees, including a small Canadian sales office and an engineering facility in Ottawa for one of its data protection solutions. It will add 43 employees from CryptoCard, primarily in Canada and the U.K. Gonen said their business is primarily indirect, with any direct deals being the rare exception.
“The vast majority of our data protection business is indirect,” said Gonen. “When we go direct, it’s out of the ordinary.”
The vendor will be focused on bringing Cryptocard’s existing partners under the SafeNet partner program, and enabling SafeNet’s partners to sell the Cryptocard solutions. In time, integrated solutions will be brought to market.
“We’ll be focused on taking the best of both worlds and making sure the channel gets the ability to offer market-leading solutions for authentication, both as a service and on premise,” said Gonen.
An enablement program is already in place to educate SafeNet partners on the Cryptocard solutions and give them the tools to get certified to sell them. Cryptocard partners will also be encouraged to certify on and sell SafeNet’s offerings.
Gonen said SafeNet has been in the Canadian market for 15 years, and has found good success with commercial organizations, as well as the federal government and the Canadian Army, particularly on the authentication side.
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