There are dark clouds up ahead for McAfee as Intel is closing in on a deal to sell Stonesoft, the cyber security firm it acquired two years ago to Raytheon.
Stonesoft is reportedly being sold to Raytheon-Websense in a deal that is likely going to be made public later today.
This could be an early indication of the things in store for McAfee as industry experts opine that McAfee might be removed from Intel’s networking security as soon as the deal is finalised. As McAfee has not been able to boost Intel’s profits, it was impending decision Intel was set to make in order to cut costs.
Stonesoft is a Finnish cyber security company that was acquired by Intel for $389 million two years ago. Stonesoft was Intel’s major acquisition that was believed to boost its cyber security wing. Intel had made a big leap into this domain by acquiring McAfee five years earlier for a staggering sum of $7.7 billion. Later Intel’s cyber security wing was renamed as Intel security to give it a new identity. The acquisition of Stonesoft helped Intel strengthen its products providing computer firewalls.
Inter Security’s senior vice president and general manager Chris Young has revealed that selling Stonesoft is a first of the similar things to come as the company wants to sell loss making units and add new products in prospective domains to keep up with long term goals.
“We are making some tough trade-offs in our portfolio. We’re also bringing new products.”
Intel’s plan to sell Stonesoft is in-line with HP’s similar plan to sell TippingPoint to TrendMicro, which indicates the global slowdown in this space.
Stonesoft’s newest buyer Raytheon is a major player in the defense industry sector that hopes to become the numero-uno in the cyber security systems.
It made its intentions clear when it acquired Websense for $1.9 billion in April this year. As part of the deal Websense was suffixed with Raytheon and became Raytheon-Websense dealing with cyber security products. Its 80% ownership lies with Raytheon, while the remaining is controlled by Vista Equity Partners.
Raytheon and Intel are yet to disclose the terms of deal, but Stonesoft’s acquisition will likely benefit Raytheon’s status as a dominant player in cyber security products.
