In the post-pandemic world, one thing that stayed constant was the steady flow of mergers and acquisitions in the tech world. Which do you think were the most significant mergers and acquisitions of 2021?
Here is our top list.
November
Ericsson Acquires Vonage
Ericsson has acquired Vonage. The merger agreement was approved unanimously by the Board of Vonage. The transaction builds upon Ericsson’s stated intent to expand globally in the wireless enterprise. The core of the strategy is to build leading mobile networks through technology leadership. This provides the foundation to build an enterprise business. The acquisition of Vonage is the next step in delivering on that strategic priority.
GBG Acquires Acuant
GB Group, the experts in digital location, identity and identity fraud software, acquired Acuant, leading identity verification and KYC/AML compliance provider. The combination will support GBG’s purpose to build trust in a digital world, delivering differentiated solutions for all points of the identity verification and identity fraud customer journey.
IBM Acquires ReaQta
IBM acquired endpoint security company ReaQta, expanding its footprint in the extended detection and response (XDR) market. ReaQta’s tools use AI to identify and manage threats while staying hidden from cyberattackers automatically. Joining forces with IBM enables ReaQta to enhance and scale its AI capabilities across all types of environments via its threat detection and response platform.
CrowdStrike Acquires SecureCircle
CrowdStrike acquired SaaS-based cybersecurity service SecureCircle in an all-cash deal, allowing SecureCircle to extend Zero Trust security to data on the endpoint.SecureCircle’s technology will help CrowdStrike modernise data protection and enable customers to enforce Zero Trust at the device, identity, and data levels.
October
NetApp Acquires CloudCheckr
NetApp has acquired CloudCheckr, expanding its Spot by NetApp CloudOps platform. CloudCheckr is a leading cloud optimisation platform that provides cloud visibility and insights to lower costs, maintain security and compliance, and optimise cloud resources. The acquisition enables organisations to deploy infrastructure and business applications faster while reducing their capital and operational costs.
Siemens Acquires Wattsense
Siemens Smart Infrastructure has acquired French startup Wattsense, a hardware and software firm that offers IoT management systems for small and mid-size buildings. Wattsense enables the adoption of energy management practices in facilities with little or no building management system technology. The acquisition will accelerate the adoption of IoT systems in a wide range of buildings, bringing sustainability, comfort and cost benefits to more people and businesses.
McAfee Merges With FireEye
The combination of McAfee and FireEye will be one of the world’s largest pure-play enterprise cybersecurity companies. The combined business will be focused on two speedboats going forward, extended detection and response (XDR) and secure access service edge (SASE). The company’s XDR offering will combine the FireEye Helix SIEM platform, endpoint detection and response (EDR) and email security tools with McAfee’s endpoint protection, network security and data loss prevention offerings.
Microsoft Acquires Ally.io
Microsoft acquired Ally.io to use technology to connect to work, purpose and results in the hybrid world. Ally.io, a leading OKR (objectives and key results) company, joined the Microsoft Viva family as part of the employee experience platform (EXP) designed to help companies embrace the new digital work life.
September
Kape Technologies Acquires ExpressVPN
Kape Technologies acquired leading virtual private network provider ExpressVPN. It is one of the most significant buys of a foreign outfit for an Israel-based company to date. Kape developed a range of privacy and security products for personal data protection and currently serves over 2.5 million paying subscribers worldwide. The acquisition of ExpressVPN increased its paid subscriber base to over six million and created a tier-one digital privacy and security player.
Akamai Acquires Guardicore
Akamai acquired Guardicore, which provides micro-segmentation and workload protection tools for data centres and public clouds. Its tech is designed to limit user access to only applications authorised to communicate to reduce the attack surface. The acquisition added Guardicore’s micro-segmentation capabilities into its ZeroTrust security portfolio, including Web Application Firewall, Zero Trust Network Access, Domain Name System Firewall, and Secure Web Gateway tools.
LG Acquires Cybellum
LG Electronics acquired Cybellum, an Israel-based automotive cybersecurity specialist that detects and assesses connected vehicle services and hardware vulnerabilities through a digital twin approach. LG has been building a profile as an investor in interesting automotive startups, and this is its first acquisition out of Israel. This acquisition underscores some significant trends in the world of connected cars and cybersecurity.
OneTrust Acquires Tugboat Logic
OneTrust, the category-defining enterprise platform to operationalise trust, signed a definitive agreement to acquire Tugboat Logic, a technology platform that simplifies and automates information security assurance. As a part of OneTrust, Tugboat Logic will deliver a security platform companies can grow into. Tugboat Logic provides advanced automation and intelligence capabilities for smaller security teams that help them build security programs and win business.
Mastercard Acquires CipherTrace
Mastercard acquired blockchain analytics startup CipherTrace in a move to expand its push into digital assets. CipherTrace’s solutions enable banks, exchanges and other financial customers to screen blockchain transactions for fraud and money laundering. The acquisition will build on CipherTrace’s suite of digital assets and Mastercard’s cyber security solutions to provide businesses with greater transparency to help identify and understand their risks and help manage their digital asset regulatory and compliance obligations.
Extreme Acquires Ipanema
Extreme closed the acquisition of Ipanema, the cloud-native enterprise SD-WAN business unit of Infovista. The acquisition brings a talented team and a rich technology platform to accelerate the strategy to deliver new cloud-driven software services to support the enterprise customers.
August
NortonLifeLock Merges With Avast
Antivirus vendor NortonLifeLock merged with Avast in a transaction combining cash and stock in two different options. This merger will create a new industry-leading consumer Cyber Safety business, leveraging both groups’ established brands, technology, and innovation to deliver substantial benefits to consumers, shareholders, and other stakeholders.
Elastic Acquires R&D Site
Elastic NV, an open-source search and analytics engine for data, acquired an Israel-based cybersecurity startup R&D Site. Established in 2020 to provide enterprises in cloud-native environments to integrate authorisation policy management right into their applications. The acquisition allowed Elastic to provide security teams with a new tool for collecting and detecting security information and events.
July
EY Australia Acquires SecureWorx
Ernst & Young, Australia acquired cyber security consultancy SecureWorx. The acquisition strengthens EY Australia’s cyber security services offering to clients in responding to new mandatory requirements in the Security Legislation Amendment (Critical Infrastructure) Bill 2020. SecureWorx provides multi-cloud services, managed security operations, and security advisory services designed to cater to customers’ sensitive needs.
WeRide Acquires MoonX.AI
WeRide acquired MoonX.AI, an autonomous trucking startup. The company has completed open road tests and trial operations in China and over 3,00,000 kilometres of autonomous testing. The acquisition will help WeRide’s strategic development in autonomous driving technology, product innovation, commercial applications, and talent pool.
Giesecke+Devrient Acquires Pod Group
Giesecke+Devrient, a global security technology group, acquired Pod Group. The acquisition will build on Pod Group’s positioning as providers of the connectivity, infrastructure and managed services enterprises must own and control their IoT networks. At the same time, it aims to complement G+D’s offering of trusted connectivity enablement for the IoT with tailored connectivity management services.
June
IBM acquires Turbonomic
IBM announced the closing of its acquisition of Turbonomic. This acquisition will drive the future of AI-driven, cross-cloud application operations and help customers in application performance and governance for any applications hosting platform. Turbonomic is known for its Application Resource Management (ARM) that provides an application-driven consumption model to assure performance and governance.
Hewlett Packard Enterprise acquires Determined AI
Hewlett Packard Enterprise acquired Determined AI, a startup that delivers a software stack to train AI models faster using its open-source machine learning (ML) platform. HPE combines Determined AI’s software solution with its high-performance computing (HPC) offerings to implement and train ML-powered models to provide faster and accurate insights from their data in almost every industry.
Nvidia acquires DeepMap
Nvidia acquired DeepMap, a startup dedicated to building high-definition maps for autonomous vehicles to navigate the world safely. Acquiring DeepMap extends Nvidia’s mapping products, helping it scale worldwide map operations and expand its complete self-driving expertise.
Microsoft Acquires ReFirm Labs
Microsoft is active in acquiring Artificial Intelligence firms to provide better customer service. Acquiring ReFirm Labs, Microsoft aims to enhance IoT security and chip-to-cloud protection. ReFirm Labs have started enriching firmware analysis and security capabilities from the intelligent edge as well as IoT.
AWS Acquires Wickr
AWS has acquired Wickr to provide customers and partners with advanced security features as Wickr brings secure and end-to-end encrypted communication technology. This acquisition will help organisations adapt to the new ecosystem and collaborate more to offer new products and services to customers and partners.
JFRog Acquires Vdoo
JFrog acquired a cybersecurity firm Vdoo. Vdoo has built an AI-based platform that detects software vulnerabilities specifically for connected devices, also known as the internet of things. The acquisition will change the way software is being created, released and updated to the edge will be the companies compass as they, together, offer the market a binary-focussed solution to secure their organisation’s software assets.
May
Okta Acquires Auth0
Okta completed its acquisition of Auth0. Together, Okta and Auth0 address a broad set of digital identity use cases, providing secure access and enabling the use of any technology safely. This acquisition will transform an organisation by providing seamless and secure access for both customers and employees. Okta and Auth0 share a vision for the identity market.
DataRobot Acquires Zepl
DataRobot, a player in automated AI and ML, acquired Zepl, a cloud data science and analytics platform. DataRobot incorporated Zepl as a cloud-native, self-services notebook in its enterprise AI platform. The combination of DataRobot and Zepll enable data scientists to code their tasks and custom models, extending the out-of-the-box capabilities.
April
Microsoft Acquires Nuance
Microsoft announced the acquisition of Nuance, an AI-based tech company. Nuance provides speech recognition and conversational AI services and is best known for its deep learning voice transcription service, popular in the health sector. Nuance’s voice recognition technology also powers Apple’s Siri. Microsoft is making efforts to provide industry-specific cloud offerings.
February
AutoDesk Acquires Innovyze
AutoDesk acquired Innovyze, a provider of smart water infrastructure modelling and simulation technology. The combination will leverage artificial intelligence and machine learning solutions to predict and optimise operations. The acquisition helps Autodesk position itself as a leading global provider of end-to-end digital solutions for water infrastructure. It creates a path to more sustainable and digitised water industry.
January
Qualcomm Acquires Nuvia
Qualcomm acquired Nuvia, a high-performance CPU and technology design team, Systems on a Chip (SoC), and power management for compute-intensive devices and applications. The addition of NUVIA CPUs to Qualcomm Technologies’ already leading mobile graphics processing unit (GPU), AI engine, DSP, and dedicated multimedia accelerators extends the leadership of Qualcomm Snapdragon platforms’ leadership positions Snapdragon as the preferred platform for the future of connected computing.
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