BlackBerry – no longer a phone maker – is also no longer an endpoint security vendor after agreeing to sell its “Cylance” unit to Arctic Wolf.
BlackBerry bought EDR firm Cylance for $1.4 billion in 2019.
It is selling it for $160 million in cash; striking value-destruction for what is well-regarded software. ARR for BlackBerry's broader "cyber" business was $279 million, per its last earnings call; Cylance customer churn was noted.
SecuSUITE not included in sale
The deal does NOT include BlackBerry’s Secure Communications portfolio of businesses like BlackBerry UEM, AtHoc and SecuSUITE propositions.
“[Our] Secure Communications business will remain an integral part of the BlackBerry portfolio” said BlackBerry – whose customers in this corner of the market include NATO, as well as various law enforcement agencies.
Arctic Wolf buys Blackberry Cylance
Minnesota-headquartered cybersecurity firm Artic Wolf said BlackBerry’s customers will “continue to be fully supported” and also gain its expertise.
Arctic Wolf provides managed detection and response services and the deal gives it access to/telemetry directly from the secured endpoint.
The $160 million cash – plus $5 million in Arctic Wolf shares – deal will close within the next quarter, the two said in a release on December 16.
See: Blackberry is already in 215m cars. It wants to be in fighter jets too
Arctic Wolf CPO Dan Schiappa said in a blog this week: “The [Arctic Wolf] Aurora Platform [for security operations] has integrated with Cylance for over seven years, and their ability to stop 98% of endpoint attacks before they begin is something we have seen first-hand in our SOC.
“We believe the deep and differentiated integration Cylance will have within our Aurora Platform will… help our customers who choose Cylance as their endpoint protection achieve best-in-class protection,” he added.
Cylance was a Customers’ Choice vendor for 2024 in the endpoint protection platform (EPP) category in Gartner Peer Insights.
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