Firesale at Preventsys

As Mike Rothman at Security Incite blogged, McAfee bought Preventsys today in a firesale.  According to Reuters, the McAfee spokesman said the deal was in the "low millions".  That means under 10 million to me.  Now, I know Mike has written in the past, that in this new world order, we all have to lower our expectations, but even he agrees that this one was a fire sale.  Preventsys had raised quite a bit of money over the years and I don't think their VC's made anything on this one. 

We used to compete with Preventsys a few years back with our VAM product.  At the time they were the only other solution we saw that imported other 3rd party scanner output like we can in VAM. They also shipped with the Nessus scanner. But when the licensing changed on NASL scripts, they stopped shipping with a scanner and relied on customers having a 3rd party scanner to use.  Their angle was always to take the scanner information and overlay it with compliance and policy information to measure risk and compliance.  It was a nice play and some of their reports were actually pretty good.  I think they just did not pick up customers quick enough to replace the burn.  When they went to raise more money, I think it was a down round and expensive. After that, the VC's really started calling the shots and the whole management team from the CEO on down were put out.  Since then they have been sort of floundering trying to find their way.  At one point, I thought they were moving toward some sort of SIM like functionality. 

In any event, obviously they had to make a "strategic move" and McAfee scooped them up cheap.  I would imagine their relationships with Qualys and nCircle will end and this will help prop up the compliance reporting for the Foundstone product.  Don't know if it will be much help with their IPS though. 

Personally, as an entrepreneur, I am always saddened by these kinds of deals.  I know people's dreams, blood, sweat and tears were poured into this company and it didn't end the way they would have liked.  However, on the bright side they built something that at least someone thought of highly enough to pay millions of dollars for.  The experiences learned, will benefit them on the next go around of this crazy carousel that we all ride.