FireEye, Inc. First to Target Network Access Control Market with Patent-Pending Virtualization Technology
 
Founded by Former CTO of Sun Microsystems' N1 Products, Network Security Innovator Lands $6.45 Million Funding Round Led by Norwest Venture Partners and Sequoia Capital
 
MENLO PARK, Calif.—May 1, 2006—FireEye, Inc., a pioneer in the burgeoning Network Access Control (NAC) market, today announced its entry into the space with patent-pending virtual machine technology to provide the most accurate and easy-to-deploy internal network security solution. Founded by the former CTO of Sun Microsystems' N1 products, Ashar Aziz, and headed by security industry veterans from Cisco, McAfee, and Symantec, FireEye has closed a Series A round of funding of $6.45 million led by Norwest Venture Partners and Sequoia Capital. The company's first product, expected in the summer of 2006, leverages virtual machines within a network appliance to examine the impact of suspicious network traffic in an instrumented virtual environment.
"FireEye has developed a genuinely transformational technology that plays into an enormous market opportunity," said Promod Haque, managing partner at Norwest Venture Partners. "Strong positive reaction from customers, coupled with increasing business pressure to protect against zero-day attacks, worms, and network-borne malware, were key factors in driving the current funding round."
According to a recent report by Infonetics Research, a leading international market research and consulting firm, Network Access Control (NAC) is the "Holy Grail" of network security. Infonetics projects the NAC market will grow from $323 million in 2005 to $3.9 billion in 2008, driven primarily by increasing desire to protect against internal malware infections.
"The ability to monitor for anomalous traffic and the ability to quickly contain this traffic are important aspects of a post-connect network access control process," said Lawrence Orans, security analyst for Gartner. "The challenge is finding the right match for your environment with a solution that provides high levels of coverage without excessive quarantines or false positives."
Effortless Network Access Control
Security products have historically been difficult to deploy, configure, and manage. FireEye technology allows IT administrators to effortlessly protect internal network access by securing against infected machines that spread zero-day attacks, worms, and network-borne malware, without the challenges of unnecessary quarantines, software agents, or complex policy administration.
FireEye technology goes beyond traditional indicators of infection, such as policy violations or behavioral deviations, to precisely identify attacks and eliminate the need to resolve false positives and prevent non-infected machines from being unnecessarily quarantined. With capabilities that are refined from a technological and management perspective, FireEye will increase business productivity through operational efficiency and deliver management that will set the standard for network access control.
"Industry analysts have projected the network access control market to grow to nearly four billion dollars in just under two years; however, today's NAC solutions are time-consuming and painful for organizations to deploy," said Gaurav Garg, a partner at Sequoia Capital. "With an effective, simple-to-deploy NAC solution, FireEye will fulfill the critical customer requirement for 'effortless NAC' and is well-positioned to garner marketshare in this still burgeoning industry."
Top-Notch, Security-Veteran Team Positions FireEye for Success
Ashar Aziz, founder and CEO of FireEye, has received more than 25 patents over his career as a leading pioneer in the area of network security and infrastructure virtualization technology. Prior to FireEye, Aziz founded Terraspring, a company focused on data center automation and virtualization. Terraspring was acquired by Sun Microsystems in 2002. Aziz joined Sun Microsystems upon this acquisition as CTO of the company's N1 program. Supporting Aziz is a top-notch team of seasoned security industry veterans from Cisco, McAfee, and Symantec, providing leadership in the areas of sales, marketing, engineering, and operations.
"We are transforming the NAC game with breakthrough technology that increases network security, while freeing valuable IT resources and ensuring business continuity," said Ashar Aziz, CEO of FireEye. "FireEye's first-of-its-kind solution to a very challenging network security problem will prove invaluable for companies seeking an 'always on' network for validated enterprise users."
About FireEye, Inc.
FireEye, Inc. is the leader in anti-botnet protection, enabling organizations to protect critical intellectual property, computing resources, and network infrastructure against bot infiltration. Today's most damaging attacks originate from and through highly organized botnets, or networks of remotely controlled, compromised machines. FireEye delivers a complete solution that is designed from the ground up to detect and protect organizations from botnets through global and local intelligence and analysis. The company is backed by Sequoia Capital, Norwest Venture Partners, and JAFCO. For more information, contact (408) 321-6300 or email: .
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