CA Snaps Up Management-Software Vendor Control-F1

CA has made its second acquisition in as many weeks, this time snapping up closely held Control-F1, a supplier of remote PC support software, for an undisclosed sum.

Control-F1 provides high-end support automation solutions that are designed to proactively detect, prevent and repair problems on client devices before they become disruptive.

The two companies already had an existing partnership; as a result, Control-F1's software is integrated with CA's Unicenter Service Desk, according to Lokesh Jindal, CA's vice president of Business Service Optimization.

Targeted primarily at large enterprises, Control-F1's software can cost anywhere from $50,000 up into the millions of dollars, and is currently sold direct, through the company envisions it will offer it through its largest systems- integration partners, managed services providers and outsourcers over time.

Among the company's three products are SupportBridge Live Automation, which is designed to let administrators remotely diagnose and repair PCs; SupportBridge Self Healing Automation, which proactively monitors registry and configuration settings as well as the state of hardware and apps; and SupportBridge Self Service Automation, a portal-based tool that lets individuals resolve their own issues.

"Desktops are a cause of significant cost, so the focus of Control-F1 is we give great ROI from a cost-reduction perspective, not just form an autonomic [computing] perspective," CA's Jindal says. The acquisition has already been finalized.

CA last week said it plans to acquire Wily, a supplier of Web application-management software, for $375 million.