Trend Micro Posts Net Sales Record

Officials at Trend Micro reported a strong end to 2007 in the company's earnings report Feb. 14.

The Tokyo-based security vendor posted a record $231 million in net sales in the fourth quarter, officials said. In yen, that figure represents a 13 percent year-over-year increase, and a 6 percent jump from the third quarter. The growth in sales was driven largely by sales to businesses, with enterprises and small and midsize businesses contributing to 74 percent of Trend Micro's revenue. The consumer business made up the remaining 26 percent.

Trend Micro CEO Eva Chen credited the company's financial success in a large part to its strategy of pushing security into the cloud and its focus on stopping data leaks.

"Our customizable, multilayered approach for inbound and outbound content security was enhanced through the introduction of products with Trend Micro Web reputation and in-the-cloud security software as a service," Chen said in a statement. "The Provilla acquisition launched us into the data leak prevention and education [market]. For 2008, Trend Micro will continue to battle the changing threat landscape with a service-oriented culture and a solution set whose main focus will always be the needs of our customers."

Click here to read more about Trend Micro's acquisition of Provilla. 

As part of its security-in-the-cloud focus, Trend Micro launched an SAAS offering and a Web site reputation service dubbed TrendProtect.

The growth in Trend Micro's business mirrors reports of increases in the security business of its two biggest rivals, McAfee and Symantec. Trend Micro made a major acquisition in the DLP (data loss prevention) space, buying Provilla for an undisclosed sum. Other relatively recent acquisitions in the DLP market include Symantec's purchase of Vontu, McAfee's acquisition of encryption vendor SafeBoot and Websense's purchase of Port Authority Technologies for $90 million.

Trend Micro rebranded Provilla's flagship data leak prevention product suite as Trend Micro LeakProof 3.0 in December, baking in interactive endpoint alerts that IT administrators can customize to educate their companies' work forces.