EMC Acquires Compliance Specialist Archer Technologies

EMC continues to branch out in areas peripheral to storage, most recently in the data governance, risk and compliance sector.

The hardware and software vendor announced Jan. 4 that it plans to acquire privately held Archer Technologies, a provider of GRC software. Financial details of the transaction were not released, but EMC reported that the deal will not have a material impact on revenue for the full 2010 fiscal year.

Archer has about 6 million licensed users and a client list that includes 25 of the Fortune 100, EMC said.

Archer makes automated, integrated GRC software for managing corporate policies and objectives for their life cycles. Its products automate, analyze and manage business risks, while helping corporate policies adhere to compliance requirements.

Archer's frontline product is the SmartSuite Framework, which includes management functions controlling management of policies, risk issues, compliance, business continuity and audits.

The acquisition is expected to close in the first quarter of 2010.

Archer will be melded into EMC's RSA security division. Thus, EMC obtains another brand of software that establishes, monitors and reports on risk and enforcement policies for physical or virtualized infrastructures or both.

"Traditional security management focuses primarily on addressing technology issues, but our customers are telling us that their real challenges are in the areas of policy management, audit and compliance," RSA President Art Coviello said in a news release.

"You can't manage what you can't see. The Archer solution not only offers the visibility into risk and compliance that customers need, it brings stronger policy management capabilities to the RSA portfolio. The end result is customers are able to better manage their security programs and prove compliance across both physical and virtual infrastructures, and effectively communicate to the business."

Better centralized management of new-generation data center features appears to be driving EMC's acquisition strategy.

In May 2009, EMC acquired Configuresoft, a former OEM partner that makes server configuration, change and compliance management software. In August 2009, EMC bought FastScale, whose software optimizes image management to enable better performance and scalability of private cloud systems.