Citrix Systems Inc., maker of widely used application access software, has snapped up firewall vendor Teros for an undisclosed fee in an attempt to boost its application security story. (See Citrix Acquires Teros.)
The deal comes hot on the heels of Citrixs $300 million acquisition of traffic management specialist NetScaler earlier this year. Teros also joins SSL VPN/VOIP gateway vendor Net6 as part of the Citrix product family. (See Citrix to Buy NetScaler for $300M, Citrix Buys NetScaler and Citrix Buys SSL Vendor Net6.)
Teros customer Eric Beasley, senior network administrator at business process specialist Baker Hill, thinks the latest deal spells good news for users. It makes sense to me, he says. I think that youre starting to see a convergence in the market in terms of the different applications that run on a gateway.
Specifically, Beasley is keen to see NetScalers load balancing technology integrated with the Teros firewall. Some of the things that NetScaler is doing, I would like to see Teros go on top of that."
According to Citrixs roadmap, Beasley should get his wish -- even though the timeline isn't nailed down. In a prepared statement released this morning, Citrix says it will now sell and support the Teros product line, which will be re-branded as the Citrix NetScaler Application Firewall. And while it will continue to sell the products as standalone offerings, Citrix intends to offer the Teros technology as a software module for the Citrix NetScaler application delivery system in 2006.