Finjan

Finjan is a company which owns the patented technology used in many enterprise web security solutions, including real-time and behavior-based malware prevention. The original hardware and software divisions of Finjan were acquired by M86 Security in 2009.[1] Finjan continues to hold patents for various Web security technologies and licenses these patents to Trustwave (formerly M86) among others.[2][3] The company has headquarters in New York and in Menlo Park, California[4]

History

Finjan was founded in 1997 by Shlomo Touboul, a serial entrepreneur who founded his first company, Shani Computers, in 1985 and sold it to Intel in 1994. He then worked for Intel for a while, before starting Finjan.[5] In 1998 Touboul decided to bring in an experienced seasoned CEO, who would be able to develop and grow the company more quickly, he then left to start his own venture capital fund.[6]

In 2001, the company ran into financial difficulties and Touboul was asked by the board of directors to rejoin the company as CEO. Touboul realigned the company's strategy, moving away from developing only software solutions to combined hardware and software security appliances; additionally, the company moved to a channel sales model.[5] In December 2002 Finjan acquired [7] the assets of Alchemedia, a software developer with a DRM product called Clever Content, and several DRM patents; Alchemedia also had ties to Israel, as its founder Daniel Schreiber was Israeli, though the company was technically headquartered in the Dallas area. In 2005, following disagreements with the board, Touboul left again and started a new company Yoggie Security Systems.[6]

In October 2007 Eric Benhamou, former CEO and chairman of 3COM, was appointed as chairman of Finjan. He also invested in the company through his venture capital fund - Benhamou Global Ventures.[8]

In November 2009 the hardware and software divisions of Finjan were sold to M86 Security, a global computer security firm based in Orange, California with international headquarters in London and offices worldwide. M86 was subsequently acquired by Trustwave, who still use Finjan's technology patents under a licensing agreement.[9]

Finjan appliances are now sold as Trustwave Secure Web Gateway.

Investors

Finjan's initial shareholders included Cisco,[10] Microsoft, Bessemer Venture Partners, Benchmark Capital, HarbourVest Partners and Israel Seed Partners. In November 2008, the company secured an additional investment of $22M, which brought the total capital invested in Finjan since its founding to $67 million.[11] The company's securities were listed publicly in 2013 on the NASDAQ. It trades under the symbol FNJN.[12]

Intellectual property and technology

Finjan invented the concept of proactive content security with behavior-based content analysis technology. This and other selected technology patents were licensed to Microsoft in July 2005. In April 2009, Finjan's intellectual property portfolio included granted and pending patents in the areas of behavior-based security and digital rights management.[10] Finjan's portfolio includes processes that enable networks to execute security plans that counteract the effects of polymorphic code designed to hide malware. The advent of cloud computing brought about an expanded need for behavior-based threat detection.[13] Cloud computing also increased network capacity for load balancing, enabling security systems to use behavior-based methods covered by Finjan patents. The company has licensed its technology to numerous security solution providers, including Microsoft, Cisco, Trustwave and Websense. The company pursues legal action against some companies who they consider to be providing products that use their patents without license.

References

  1. ↑ "M86 Security Acquires Finjan". Reuters. 2009-11-03.
  2. ↑ http://www.eweek.com/c/a/Security/McAfee-Loses-Finjan-Patent-Infringement-Appeal-Owes-Damages-480263/
  3. ↑ http://news.cnet.com/8301-27080_3-10389066-245.html
  4. ↑ http://www.linkedin.com/companies/finjan
  5. 1 2 Griml, Guy (September 28, 2006), "Yoggie will change security, just like the iPod changed music", Haaretz, retrieved 2010-04-24
  6. 1 2 Feldman, Batya (12-07-2005), "Finjan board fires CEO Shlomo Touboul - Former HP Israel deputy CEO Asher Polani will replace Touboul", Globes, retrieved 2010-04-24 Check date values in: |date= (help)
  7. ↑ "Alchemedia, Inc.: Private Company Information - BusinessWeek", Bloomberg Businessweek
  8. ↑ "Finjan names new CEO, chairman", San Jose Business Journal, October 16, 2007, retrieved 2010-04-24
  9. ↑ M86 Security Acquires Finjan Reuters
  10. 1 2 http://www.ivc-online.com/ivcWeeklyItem.asp?articleID=4136
  11. ↑ http://www.masshightech.com/stories/2008/11/17/daily34-HarbourVest-leads-22M-round-for-secure-web-firm.html
  12. ↑ http://www.nasdaq.com/symbol/fnjn
  13. ↑ http://citeseerx.ist.psu.edu/viewdoc/download?doi=10.1.1.419.2604&rep=rep1&type=pdf

External links

This article is issued from Wikipedia - version of the Sunday, February 21, 2016. The text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution/Share Alike but additional terms may apply for the media files.