McAfee closes Stonesoft deal and plans next-generation firewall tool

McAfee has finalised its deal to acquire Stonesoft, announcing plans to offer advanced next-generation firewall technology acquired as part of the deal to its customers.
The deal was announced in May when McAfee paid $389m to buy the Finnish firm. Now the deal has completed the Stonesoft team will become a part of the McAfee Network Security Business Unit led by Pat Calhoun.
Stonesoft regional director, Ashish Patel, told V3 the deal is designed to offer businesses next-generation protection against the sea of evolved targeted attacks facing them. "Before next generation firewall technology came to market firewalling was quite a point product - so you had your firewall technology then you had your AV added onto that and so on," he said.
"The next generation firewall technology is about bringing all of that together to deal with advanced threats. The threats we see on a daily basis are evolving and rapidly becoming much more complex and fluid in the way they attack. It can be quite difficult for companies to maintain the level of security they need to protect their businesses. That's where firewalling and intrusion prevention systems come into place."
Patel said the upgraded tech will vastly bolster McAfee's existing firewall portfolio, boasting it will be a key tool in the firm's network security expansion strategy.
"McAfee does have firewall technology but it's proxy based, this is obviously a next generation Firewall that they've taken on board. One of the key reasons to take on the technologies is to ensure McAfee itself holds a competitive advantage in the network security space, adding to the portfolio," he told V3.
Patel added that Stonesoft will continue to support its existing 6,500 customers and will honour its forecast update and strategy announcements.
Network security is forecast to be a boom area in the security industry. Gartner estimates that the market will boast a seven percent compound annual growth rate (CAGR) over the next five years and be worth $11.4bn by 2017.
McAfee is one of many companies expanding its technology portfolio to deal with the recent influx of targeted attacks hitting businesses. Most recently competing security firm MalwareBytes acquired US firm Zero Vulnerability Labs, adding its flagship ExploitShield browser protection service to its anti-hacker arsenal.