Cisco To Add Another Security Vendor To Its Stable

The San Jose, Calif.-based company on Monday unveiled an agreement to buy privately held security vendor Protego Networks in a cash deal valued at about $65 million. Cisco said it expects to close the deal in its fiscal second quarter, which ends Jan. 29.

The move comes on the heels of last week's merger-and-acquisition spree, including Symantec's $13.5 billion merger with Veritas Software, Oracle's $10.3 billion acquisition of PeopleSoft and Sprint's $35 billion merger with Nextel.

Protego's lineup of PN-MARS appliances detect, correlate and mitigate threats for SMB and enterprise customers. The Sunnyvale, Calif.-based company, founded in August 2002, has 38 employees and launched its first channel partner program in September.

Protego represents the sixth security vendor that Cisco has acquired over the last two years. Other networking vendors also have been snapping up security firms. Juniper Networks earlier this year acquired NetScreen Technologies and last week 3Com said it plans to acquire TippingPoint in a $430 million deal.