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ivanti has acquired security firms mobileiron and pulse secure

AVATAR Zack Whittaker
Zack Whittaker
Security Editor, TechCrunch
December 1, 2020
ivanti has acquired security firms mobileiron and pulse secure

Ivanti, a company specializing in IT security solutions, has completed the purchase of two notable security businesses: MobileIron, a leader in enterprise mobile security, and Pulse Secure, a provider of virtual network solutions for corporations.

Ivanti announced on Tuesday that it finalized the acquisition of MobileIron for $872 million in company stock – a transaction approved by 91% of MobileIron’s shareholders – and also obtained Pulse Secure from its owner, Siris Capital Group. The financial details of the Pulse Secure acquisition were not revealed.

Both of these transactions are now complete.

Ivanti originated in 2017 through a merger initiated by Clearlake Capital. The firm combined Heat Software with Landesk, which was previously owned by Thoma Bravo, to establish Ivanti. The company, with its main offices in Salt Lake City, primarily concentrates on security for enterprise IT environments, encompassing endpoint management, asset management, and supply chain security. Since its inception, Ivanti has expanded through further acquisitions, including Concorde Solutions, based in the U.K., and RES Software.

Both MobileIron and Pulse Secure have recently been the subject of considerable attention due to security flaws discovered within their technologies that have been exploited by malicious actors.

The U.K.’s National Cyber Security Center issued a warning last month regarding a remotely exploitable vulnerability in MobileIron, which was addressed with a patch in June. This flaw allowed unauthorized access to enterprise networks. The U.S. Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA) indicated that this vulnerability was being actively targeted by sophisticated, persistent threat groups, often linked to nation-state sponsored hacking operations.

CISA also cautioned that Pulse Secure was among several corporate VPN providers experiencing vulnerabilities that have become popular targets for hackers, especially those deploying ransomware. These vulnerabilities are exploited to infiltrate networks and install file-encrypting ransomware.

#Ivanti#MobileIron#Pulse Secure#acquisition#cybersecurity#security firms

Zack Whittaker

Zack Whittaker serves as the security editor for TechCrunch and is the creator of the “this week in security” cybersecurity newsletter. He is available for secure communication via Signal using the username zackwhittaker.1337. Alternatively, you can reach him through email, or confirm the legitimacy of any contact attempts by emailing zack.whittaker@techcrunch.com.
Zack Whittaker