Sophos Group plc is a British based

security software Computer security software or cybersecurity software is any computer program designed to influence information security. This is often taken in the context of defending computer systems or data, yet can incorporate programs designed specifically ...

and hardware company. Sophos develops products for

communication endpoint A communication endpoint is a type of communication network node. It is an interface exposed by a communicating party or by a communication channel. An example of the latter type of a communication endpoint is a publish-subscribe topic or a grou ...

encryption In cryptography, encryption is the process of encoding information. This process converts the original representation of the information, known as plaintext, into an alternative form known as ciphertext. Ideally, only authorized parties can decip ...

network security Network security consists of the policies, policies, processes and practices adopted to prevent, detect and monitor unauthorized access, Abuse, misuse, modification, or denial of a computer network and network-accessible resources. Network securi ...

, email security,

mobile security Mobile security, or mobile device security, is the protection of smartphones, tablets, and laptops from threats associated with wireless computing. It has become increasingly important in mobile computing. The security of personal and business ...

and unified threat management. Sophos is primarily focused on providing security software to 1- to 5,000-seat organizations. While not a primary focus, Sophos also protects home users, through free and paid antivirus solutions (Sophos Home/Home Premium) intended to demonstrate product functionality. It was listed on the

London Stock Exchange London Stock Exchange (LSE) is a stock exchange in the City of London, England, United Kingdom. , the total market value of all companies trading on LSE was £3.9 trillion. Its current premises are situated in Paternoster Square close to St Pau ...

until it was acquired by

Thoma Bravo Thoma Bravo, LP, is an American private equity and growth capital firm with offices in San Francisco, Chicago and Miami. It is known for being particularly active in acquiring software companies and has over $114 billion in assets under manage ...

in February 2020.

History

Sophos was founded by Jan Hruska and Peter Lammer and began producing its first antivirus and encryption products in 1985."Sophos: the early years"
''Naked Security''. During the late 1980s and into the 1990s, Sophos primarily developed and sold a range of security technologies in the UK, including encryption tools available for most users (private or business). In the late 1990s, Sophos concentrated its efforts on the development and sale of antivirus technology, and embarked on a program of international expansion. In 2003, Sophos acquired

ActiveState ActiveState Software Inc is a Canadian software company headquartered in Vancouver, British Columbia. It develops, sells, and supports cross-platform development tools for dynamic languages such as Perl, PHP, Python, Ruby, and Tcl, as well ...

, a North American software company that developed anti-spam software. At that time viruses were being spread primarily through email spam and this allowed Sophos to produce a combined anti-spam and antivirus solution. In 2006, Peter Gyenes and Steve Munford were named chairman and CEO of Sophos, respectively. Jan Hruska and Peter Lammer remained as members of the board of directors. In 2010, the majority interest of Sophos was sold to Apax. In 2010, Nick Bray, formerly Group CFO at Micro Focus International, was named CFO of Sophos. In 2011, Utimaco Safeware AG (acquired by Sophos in 2008–9) were accused of supplying data monitoring and tracking software to partners that have sold to governments such as Syria: Sophos issued a statement of apology and confirmed that they had suspended their relationship with the partners in question and launched an investigation. In 2012, Kris Hagerman, formerly CEO at

Corel Corporation Cascade Parent Limited, doing business as Alludo (pronounced like "all you do"), is a Canadian software company headquartered in Ottawa, Ontario, specializing in graphics processing. Formerly called the Corel Corporation ( ; from the abbreviation ...

, was named CEO of Sophos and joined the company's board. Former CEO Steve Munford became non-executive chairman of the board. In February 2014, Sophos announced that it had acquired Cyberoam Technologies, a provider of network security products. In June 2015, Sophos announced plans to raise $US100 million on the London Stock Exchange. Sophos was floated on the FTSE in September 2015. On 14 October 2019 Sophos announced that

, a US-based private equity firm, made an offer to acquire Sophos for US$7.40 per share, representing an enterprise value of approximately $3.9 billion. The board of directors of Sophos stated their intention to unanimously recommend the offer to the company's shareholders. On 2 March 2020 Sophos announced the completion of the acquisition.

Acquisitions and partnerships

From September 2003 to February 2006, Sophos served as the parent company of

, a developer of programming tools for

dynamic programming language In computer science, a dynamic programming language is a class of high-level programming languages, which at runtime execute many common programming behaviours that static programming languages perform during compilation. These behaviors cou ...

s: in February 2006, ActiveState became an independent company when it was sold to

Vancouver Vancouver ( ) is a major city in western Canada, located in the Lower Mainland region of British Columbia. As the List of cities in British Columbia, most populous city in the province, the 2021 Canadian census recorded 662,248 people in the ...

-based

venture capitalist Venture capital (often abbreviated as VC) is a form of private equity financing that is provided by venture capital firms or funds to startups, early-stage, and emerging companies that have been deemed to have high growth potential or which hav ...

firm

Pender Financial Pender may refer to: Places * Pender, Nebraska * Pender County, North Carolina * Pender Island, British Columbia * Pender Township, Thurston County, Nebraska * Joseph John Pender House, in Wilson County, North Carolina People * Baron Pender, a ...

. In 2007, Sophos acquired ENDFORCE, a company based in

Ohio Ohio () is a state in the Midwestern region of the United States. Of the fifty U.S. states, it is the 34th-largest by area, and with a population of nearly 11.8 million, is the seventh-most populous and tenth-most densely populated. The sta ...

, United States, which developed and sold security policy compliance and

Network Access Control Network access control (NAC) is an approach to computer security that attempts to unify endpoint security technology (such as antivirus, host intrusion prevention, and vulnerability assessment), user or system authentication and network security ...

(NAC) software. In May 2011, Sophos announced the acquisition of Astaro, a privately held provider of network security solutions, headquartered in Wilmington, Massachusetts, USA and Karlsruhe, Germany. At the time Astaro was the 4th largest UTM vendor and while the deal made sense at the time Forbes questioned its viability. Sophos subsequently renamed the Astaro UTM to Sophos UTM. In November 2016, Sophos acquired Barricade, a pioneering start-up with a powerful behavior-based analytics engine built on machine learning techniques, to strengthen synchronized security capabilities and next-generation network and endpoint protection. In February 2017, Sophos acquired

Invincea Invincea, Inc. was a company that offered a suite of endpoint protection software products. Originally called Secure Command LLC, Invincea, Inc. was a venture-backed software company that provided malware threat detection, prevention, and analysis ...

, a software company that provides malware threat detection, prevention, and pre-breach forensic intelligence. In March 2020,

acquired Sophos for $3.9 billion.

References

External links

* {{Authority control 1985 establishments in England British companies established in 1985 Antivirus software English brands Companies based in Oxfordshire Computer security companies Computer security software companies Companies formerly listed on the London Stock Exchange Security software Software companies of England Software companies established in 1985 Windows security software 2020 mergers and acquisitions Private equity portfolio companies Abingdon-on-Thames

History

Acquisitions and partnerships

See also

References

External links