IBM Acquires Agile 3, Makers Of A Security Dashboard For Business Leaders

IBM has continued its acquisition spree into the new year, advancing its security posture Monday by agreeing to buy San Francisco-based Agile 3 Solutions.

The startup, founded by an IBM veteran, has a software portfolio aimed at senior business executives, helping them understand and mitigate the risks of data breaches to their organizations.

IBM Security, headquartered in Cambridge, Mass., also announced its intent to acquire Ravy Technologies, which OEMs dashboards used in the Agile 3 product line.

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Financial details of the deal weren't disclosed.

Agile 3, founded in 2009, offers a suite of products that help business leaders make decisions about security threats facing their companies through intuitive visualizations and analytics. The software design is heavily influenced by service-oriented architecture principles.

Agile 3's founder, Raghu Varadan, had been IBM's chief architect for its SOA Center of Excellence, and was responsible for implementing service-oriented architecture solutions for the IBM Global Business Services division's largest customers.

Once the acquisition is completed in the coming weeks, Agile 3's technology will be brought to market through IBM Data Security Services. The solution will also be integrated into IBM Guardium, Big Blue's data protection product.

Jazz Padda, managing director of Too Many Clouds, a U.K.-based IBM SoftLayer partner, told CRN that IBM's latest acquisition is another sign that "security is a massive, massive issue right now, especially in cloud-based computing environments."

Distributors and resellers are clamoring to see their partner vendors advance their cyber-security capabilities, Padda said.

"Company data, especially customer data, is what keeps companies running," Padda said. But "the majority of organizations do not know enough about their own data and the importance of it."

"We will be talking to our contacts at IBM to see how we can take the new product on their books to our partners and their customers," Padda told CRN.