Acronis ‘Tucks in’ Azure Specialist 5nine
Since achieving unicorn status earlier this year, Acronis has continued to transition from a simple data protection firm into a cyber protection firm with a broad range of products catering to virtual, physical, cloud and mobile platforms
Now the Switzerland-based company is boosting its Microsoft cloud offering with the acquisition of Florida-based Azure specialist 5nine.
5nine’s unified cloud management, migration and security platform will join Acronis’ cyber cloud business to give customers – most of which are Managed Service Providers (MSPs) – tools to more easily migrate workloads from their physical or virtual infrastructure to Acronis, and better manage their hybrid cloud environments.
“With a combined solution, organisations will be able to migrate all or select workloads to the cloud and then manage both on-premises and cloud virtual machines with a single interface.” said Acronis founder Serguei Beloussov in a statement. “We envision combining the functionality of the two solutions by extending Acronis’ easy-to-use, single pane of glass, resulting in IT administrators monitoring, managing and ensuring cyber protection for all workloads, regardless of their location.”
The acquisition will make 5nine a wholly-owned subsidiary of Acronis, and follows a staggering year of growth for the business. Its cyber protection technology is now used by more than five million consumers and 500,000 businesses worldwide.
In September, the firm got an added boost from an investment round led by Goldman Sachs which raised $147 million to fund acquisitions and expand the company’s presence in North America.
Then in November, Acronis executive vice chairman Kirill Tatarinov said the company was on the lookout for “tuck in” acquisitions that could easily be integrated to support continued development.
This acquisition strategy has proven popular with several cloud platforms, which have been picking up small cybersecurity firms to help protect the increasing number of enterprises using cloud technology. Palo Alto Networks agreed to purchase Amazon cloud outfit Evident.io in a $300 million cash deal in March 2018, and VMware has made a string of cloud-related purchases.
