Symantec Acquires Cloud-Based Archive LiveOffice

Symantec has acquired LiveOffice, a cloud-based archiving service, for $115 million, a move that brings in-house a company that has already integrated its technology with Symantec's platform for storing and managing legally required documents and communications.

Symantec announced the acquistion on Monday, saying LiveOffice provides customers with the ability to archive not only e-mail, but communications on social media, such as LinkedIn, Facebook and Twitter; and file sharing services, including Dropbox and Box.net. "LiveOffice, with its talented team and cloud-archiving technology, will improve our ability to connect people to information, wherever it resides," Brian Dye, vice president of product management in Symantec's Information Management Group, said in the company's blog. Symantec completed the transaction Jan. 13.

LiveOffice has already been integrated with Symantec's other information management products, including the Enterprise Vault and the Clearwell eDiscovery platform, so the acquisition won't have much impact on customers and resellers. In time, owning LiveOffice is expected to "deepen the alignment and existing integration" between the three products, Deepak Mohan, senior vice president of the Information Management Group, said in a statement.

In general, Symantec's information management products provide the ability to store and manage documents based on rules and policies set by business executives and corporate lawyers to meet operational needs and legal requirements. Because companies now use online social media to market products and communicate with customers and partners, the need to archive the communications in the cloud has grown.