Contact: Mark Fontecchio
CenturyLink acquires IT security services firm netAura as it gears up a managed security services (MSS) practice. In a forthcoming report, we write that CenturyLink has launched an updated MSS suite, which has been a popular portfolio addition for many multi-tenant datacenter and managed service providers in the past year. The target also brings experienced security personnel at a time of a shortage in skilled security workers. Finally, the move bolsters CenturyLink’s managed services platform as its legacy telecom services decline.
CenturyLink has steadily climbed the services stack since 2011, in part through acquisitions such as Savvis, database-as-a-service vendor Orchestrate and cloud management provider Tier 3. Others are doing the same. ViaWest acquiring AppliedTrust and Level 3 buying Black Lotus are just two recent examples of M&A activity in this sector. The deals particularly make sense in security, where staffing issues abound. According to 451 Research’s Voice of the Enterprise survey of 786 IT decision-makers in Q4 2015, staffing information security was one of the top pain points, ahead of options like firewall/edge network security and mobile device security. In today’s transaction, all 15 of netAura’s employees will move to CenturyLink.
We expect interest and activity to continue in this space through the rest of the year. Dell’s cybersecurity unit SecureWorks filed for an IPO in December, a move we predicted last May. Potential M&A candidates that could conceivably become targets in similar deals might include Red Canary, which is focused on advanced endpoint defense, and Encode, a UK-based security analytics firm with a managed service offering.
For more real-time information on tech M&A, follow us on Twitter @451TechMnA.