[THIN] More on the F6 purchase by Citrix
- From: "Jim Kenzig http://thethin.net" <jimkenz@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
- To: thin@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
- Date: Wed, 24 Nov 2004 08:33:08 -0800 (PST)
Citrix Buys SSL Appliance Vendor
By Paula Rooney Courtesy of CRN
Citrix Tuesday said it acquired secure access gateway vendor Net6 for $50
million.
The deal is expected to benefit the channel partners of both companies, sources
say.
Citrix, Fort Lauderdale, Fla., said the Net6 acquisition will provide it with
an SSL access gateway as well as IP telephony and voice-over-IP solutions. The
deal is expected to be completed by the end of the year, the company said.
As first reported by CRN in April, Citrix has been shopping around for an
acquisition target in the SSL VPN space and had looked at other vendors such as
Netsilica before going with Net6 of San Jose, Calif.
The purchase of Net6 will enable Citrix to fight off competition from SSL VPN
vendors and round out the company's access strategy by giving customers access
to all their corporate data. Citrix claims the installation and configuration
of the client and appliance is simple and quick.
Ross Brown, VP Worldwide Channels & Operations for Citrix, said there is no
channel conflict because Net6 has a nascent channel strategy. He said Citrix
will authorize its channel partners and resellers to sell Net6's Access Gateway
in the near future. "Net6's go to market strategy now is largely an OEM play
and their attraction is the Citrix channel,'" Brown said. "We will make the
product available to our channel players."
Citrix said Net6's SSL Access Gateway will be sold as standalone access
solution that complements the SmoothRoaming feature in the company's existing
MetaFrame Access Suite and the upcoming SmartAccess feature due in the
MetaFrame Access 4 Suite. MetaFrame Access Suite is due to ship in April,
several partners said.
Net6's SSL Access Gateway, a hybrid VPN and alternative to IPSec and
traditional SSL VPNs, provides secure access to applications from any device to
any IT resource. Citrix's MetaFrame Secure Access Manager (MSAM) provides
access to Citrix hosted applications only. Brown said Citrix will integrate the
gateway with the company's MSAM and other access technologies but those
decisions ahve not been finalized.
Net6's appliance combines IPSec and SSL VPN technology to enable secure remote
tunneling from any environment. Many customers choose SSL VPN appliances over
the Citrix offering because it gives them access to all network resources,
partners note. "MSAM can't give you that today because it only provides access
to applications and not the network,' said Mitch Northcutt, president of
RapidApp, Chicago. "This gets Citrix over that hurdle, the objections that some
people had about MSAM."
Other consultants say the deal will expand opportunities for partners of both
companies. Net6's other key products, Application Gateway and Voice Office
Application Suite, will provide application access to IP telephones and mobile
devices from leading IP PBX vendors including Avaya, Cisco, Mitel, Nortel and
Siemens. The Voice Office product allows customers to deliver applications to
the screens and speakers of IP telephones.
With Net6, Citrix will give customers a single point of access and on demand
access to both voice and data across any device type.
"Given the market position of Citrix, this will immediately make the Net6 VPN
product -- which supports both SSL VPNs and IPSec VPNs -- a major market
leader," said Adam Lipson, president and CEO of Network & Security
Technologies, Pearl River, N.Y. "Citrix will be giving Net6 the opportunity to
compete with the big guys like Cisco and Nortel. Further, Citrix has signaled
their intention to compete more in that space by acquiring a company who has
experience with IP telephony and mobile technology in addition to their VPN
devices."
Citrix has thousand of consulting partners and resellers. In July, Net6
announced a new channel program designed to give partners a 30 percent margin
on new sales. It's unclear how the deal might impact that but Citrix claims
that Net6 will continue to operate in San Jose, Calif. led by current CEO Murli
Thirumale.
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