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Cybereason Acquires Empow; XDR Cybersecurity Gains Analytics Capabilities

Cybereason has acquired security analytics startup Empow, and will integrate the acquired technology into Cybereason's XDR (eXtended detection and response) portfolio of cybersecurity offerings. Financial terms of the deal were not disclosed.

This is M&A deal 431 that MSSP Alert and ChannelE2E have covered so far in 2020. See the full M&A deal list here.

Empow's ML (machine learning) prediction algorithm anticipates attacker intent and next steps by correlating inputs from endpoint, network, identity and application telemetry, the buyer says. From there, Empow's decision-making engine "formulates preventative defense measures in real-time to detect, respond to and end malicious activity at the earliest stages of an attack," Cybereason says.

Empow's technology features integrations with more than 70 IT & security vendors, including firewall providers, email and web gateways, cloud infrastructure, threat intelligence vendors and more, the buyer says.

Empow was venture backed. The company raised $10 million in Series B funding in April 2018. Somewhere amid that funding journey, Empow's CEO position transitioned from founder Avi Chesla to Crossbeam veteran Peter George -- and then back to Chesla.

Cybereason Acquires Empow: Executive Perspectives

In a prepared statement about the deal, Cybereason Co-founder and CEO Lior Div said:

“The parallels between the evolution of the Cybereason solution over the last few years and the more recent development of the empow offerings are astounding. When we really dug into the empow capabilities, we saw how complementary our approaches are to solving the critical security issues that organizations are struggling with, and we realized that bringing empow’s capabilities and team to Cybereason was both a sound business decision and a catalyst for further market disruption.”

Added Empow Founder and CEO Avi Chesla:

“Cybereason has been recognized as a leader in the EDR and EPP space for some time, and its operation-centric approach to delivering deep contextual correlations offered by the ability to identify MalOps is defining the gold standard for XDR solutions. There was a great deal of natural synergy in everything both companies were already doing, and we are very enthusiastic about the acquisition because this is truly a case where the whole is greater than the sum of the parts.”

Cybereason Funding and Partner Program

The deal surfaces one week after Cybereason disclosed $275 million in crossover financing. That round follows $389 million in prior funding from Softbank Group, CRV, Spark Capital and Lockheed Martin.

The acquisition and financing arrives after Cybereason unveiled The Cyber Defenders League — a global partner program for MSSPs, resellers, and more.

Also, Cybereason in February 2021 hired several executives as part of its efforts to grow its channel partnerships. These hires included:

  • Abigail Maines as VP of commercial and channel sales for North America
  • Stephan Tallent as VP of MSSPs for North America
  • Ahmed Saleh as VP of incident response services

The big question: Will Cybereason pursue a potential IPO (initial public offering) on the near-term horizon? Speculation from 2019 suggested a potential Cybereason IPO in 2021 or so — though we haven’t heard updates on that chatter.

The Cybereason Defense Platform spans endpoint and extended detection and response (EDR and XDR), next-gen antivirus (NGAV), and proactive threat hunting, the company says.

Joe Panettieri

Joe Panettieri is co-founder & editorial director of MSSP Alert and ChannelE2E, the two leading news & analysis sites for managed service providers in the cybersecurity market.

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