REDMOND, Wash., June 21, 2005 — Enterprise customers looking to implement powerful and flexible security solutions will benefit from Microsoft’s recent acquisition of Sybari Software Inc., which was completed today. Sybari’s security products currently provide protection for more than 10,000 businesses worldwide. In a conversation with PressPass, Sybari Chief Technology Officer Gregory Tetrault, Sybari COO Pat FitzMaurice, and Mike Nash, vice president of the Security Business and Technology Unit at Microsoft, discuss how the acquisition will impact customers.
Mike Nash, Corporate Vice President, Microsoft Security Business & Technology Unit
PressPass: What does this news mean for Microsoft’s and Sybari’s customers?
Nash: The completion of this acquisition means that the benefits of Sybari’s products will be available to a much broader range of customers. Sybari is now a wholly owned subsidiary of Microsoft, and we’re excited at the opportunity to offer Sybari solutions to Microsoft’s enterprise customers to help protect their messaging and collaboration servers from viruses, worms and spam. We’re also looking forward to building on Sybari technology as a basis for future security solutions to help protect customers.
PressPass: What are the benefits of Sybari products? What is Sybari’s approach to securing messaging and collaboration servers, and what kinds of customers have really benefited from Sybari’s solutions?
Tetrault: Sybari has always believed that to effectively secure their networks from the ever-changing threat of viruses, worms and spam, companies need solutions that are specifically designed to protect messaging and collaboration servers. Our approach is to understand both the nature of the security threats and the platforms that we are protecting. By doing that, we’ve developed solutions that offer multiple scan engine technology, seamlessly integrate with Microsoft’s messaging and collaboration servers and effectively protect against malicious code attacks. This enables us to provide enterprises with superior messaging protection while ensuring that systems run at peak performance. By maintaining a complete focus on protecting the Microsoft Windows platform and taking the time to truly understand how Windows systems work within corporate environments, we can best protect the essential data and functions that they serve.
Pat FitzMaurice, Chief Operations Officer, Sybari Software
FitzMaurice: Our products were designed for the largest, most challenging and complex network environments. The customers that have most benefited from Sybari solutions are those who are really focused on providing some of the best protection possible for their network. Sybari has been the only company to provide the architecture to effectively support multiple scan engines.
Sybari products protect and work within existing enterprise infrastructures. Sybari customers are also Microsoft customers, and our expertise on those platforms is evidenced by our product development, knowledgeable staff and comprehensive technical support. During the large scale virus outbreaks of recent years, companies found that Sybari products came through for them. We provide them with support from the point of evaluation through the term of their license. Our level of technical support has been recognized by leading organizations including MSD2D. We have stayed focused on our customers and we have continually offered them the features and functionality to best support their network requirements. With the completion of this acquisition, we expect that this will only get better.
PressPass: Sybari’s Antigen products have been particularly successful in the enterprise. What are some of the unique features of the Antigen line that make it an effective solution for protecting messaging and collaboration servers?
Tetrault: One of the most important features in Antigen is the ability to utilize up to eight of the leading scan engine technologies for virus and worm detection. The key element of our technology is the ability to employ each scan engine for specific jobs where it can be most effective and efficient. For example certain scan engines are better equipped to handle specific types of attachments such as Word documents, ZIP files or HTML files. Through seamless integration with Microsoft Exchange, companies can utilize multiple engines and therefore ensure enhanced virus detection without affecting server performance. In addition, we provide central management features that give administrators the ability to install and manage Antigen throughout their networks.
PressPass: Why did Sybari choose to utilize multiple scan engines versus a single-engine approach?
Tetrault: We realized that multiple scan engines offer a higher level of protection and effectively minimize the possibility of viruses getting through due to a missed signature file update or engine failure. This enabled us to focus on building the solution that would enable those scan engine technologies to work better and rival the performance of single scan engine solutions. We were able to partner with some of the best labs in the world and offer a set of scan engines that are unmatched in performance and detection. By doing this, we have been able to focus on Antigen and deliver a more robust, scalable security solution for significantly reducing the number of viruses and worms that reach an organization’s messaging and collaboration servers.
PressPass: Sybari and Microsoft have both long advocated a defense-in-depth strategy for enterprise messaging security. How do Sybari’s security solutions fit into that strategy?
Tetrault: From the Sybari perspective, a defense-in-depth strategy calls for a multi-level approach in which companies utilize different antivirus and anti-spam engines at various points within an infrastructure including e-mail servers, Live Communications Server, SharePoint and SMTP gateways. This allows for greater security and enhanced scanning of all access points within a network. By utilizing leading scan engine technologies we can ensure that companies are being protected by multiple virus scan engines throughout their networks and therefore are less vulnerable to attacks.
PressPass: Sybari has been at the forefront of protecting emerging areas of collaboration such as Live Communications Server and Sharepoint. Why has Sybari made this such a focus?
Tetrault: Sybari has consistently maintained a focus on protecting the areas of a network where companies communicate, collaborate and share documents. Microsoft has always been a key partner for Sybari and we believe that Microsoft technology will continue to be the first adopted by corporations around the world. Microsoft Live Communication Server and SharePoint usage continues to grow, and by providing protection to these emerging communication applications we can enable companies to be protected against security attacks to these applications before they happen.
PressPass: How will Sybari products be offered to customers now that the acquisition is complete? How will Sybari’s distribution partners experience this integration into Microsoft?
Nash: Sybari products for the Microsoft Windows platform will be offered to customers on essentially the same terms as they were before the acquisition. Sybari solutions offer great value to customers and so our immediate plan is to continue to offer them on a standalone basis under the existing Sybari pricing and licensing model.
Many of Sybari’s current channel partners are already Microsoft partners as well, so we anticipate a smooth and quick transition. As we move forward with integration, the existing Sybari partner program will transition into the Microsoft Partner Program. A date has not been set for when the program integration will be finalized. We will provide all of our channel partners with further information as we work through the details.
For anyone who’s interested in evaluating Sybari solutions, we invite you to get in touch with a Microsoft or Sybari sales representative to learn more about Sybari products.
We invite everyone to explore what Microsoft and Sybari can offer.