Contact: Mark Fontecchio
Virtual mobile infrastructure (VMI) sees some M&A activity, with Avast Software picking up Remotium. One of the top IT security concerns for mobility is securing corporate data on individually owned devices, according to 451 Research’s survey of IT decision-makers in June. Remotium’s VMI SaaS alleviates that by providing employees access to corporate applications and data without them residing on mobile devices. The move helps Avast’s push into enterprise mobility security and opens up the potential for more M&A in the sector.
Remotium is one of a handful of startups – along with a couple big players – that is providing VMI, as we noted in April. The technology includes a virtual machine on a remote server that provides users access to mobile apps on their devices, giving employees a way to work with enterprise apps without having any corporate data on the end device. While VMI M&A has been virtually nonexistent up to now, some money has started to flow into the space – Remotium rival Hypori, for example, has raised almost $14m in the past year for its VMI software.
Other potential targets in the sector include Israel-based Nubo Software and California-based Sierraware. They and Hypori were about the same size as Remotium when we last checked, with 20-30 employees.
