Symantec's acquisitions for the two companies will enable businesses to manage both mobile devices and applications that have access to the corporate network and data.
Symantec is buying mobile app management vendor Nukona to
bolster its capabilities to offer businesses the technology they need to deal
with the proliferation of personal mobile devices that employees are using to
access corporate networks and data.
The Nukona deal, coupled with its acquisition earlier this
month of Odyssey Software, which makes mobile device management (MDM) software,
gives Symantec a solid core of offerings for corporations who are under
pressure from the growing trends of consumerization of IT and bring your own
device (BYOD), according to company officials.
With unprecedented growth rates surrounding
the adoption of mobile devices and apps, our customers are faced with the
daunting task of protecting and managing the native apps, data and environment
of these devices, Rob Greer, vice president
of product management for Symantecs Endpoint and Mobility Group, said in a
post on the Symantec blog site. Nukona will
extend Symantecs enterprise mobility portfolio to include a cross-platform
mobile application protection solution to help IT organizations protect and
isolate corporate data and applications across both corporate-owned and
personally-owned devices.
The security software giant is among a growing list of
technology vendors offering products that enable businesses to negotiate the
BYOD trend. Before, corporations could issue employees PCs and cell phones that
could be used to access the companys network, data and business applications.
Now workers, armed with smartphones and tablets like Apples iPad, are
demanding to be able to use their personal devices for work. The trend offers
greater employee productivity, and it means that corporations have to shell out
fewer dollars to pay for company-issued technology.
However, it also results in greater management and security
concerns as IT departments try to find ways to offer greater network access
while not compromising company data.
With Odyssey, Symantec is putting MDM capabilities into its
enterprise mobility portfolio, which will give businesses the needed tools to
bring on, identify and manage a wide variety of devices across many platforms,
the company said.
Nukonas mobile application management (MAM) technology
complements the Odyssey-inherited capabilities, enabling enterprises to
distribute, secure and control applications and data without having to manage
the devices themselves. On March 1, Nukona announced that it was enhancing its
Mobile Information Management suitewhich includes an enterprise app store and
policy manager software designed to put a management layer around both native
and Web apps without having to change the appby adding Content Center, which
applies the same policies to content accessed via an employees mobile device.
The Nukona products also are cross-platform, working with
Android, Apple and HTML5 applications.
With Nukona in hand, Symantec will be able to offer
corporations both MDM and MAM capabilities that will offer employees the access
theyre looking for while giving businesses the management and security
features they need, including user authentication, encryption of files, data
leakage prevention and the ability to wipe corporate data from mobile devices
as needed.
The deal, which is expected to close in April, also gives
Symantec greater traction for its security software in the mobile computing
space. No financial details of the deal were released.
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