Tripwire has entered into a definitive agreement to acquire nCircle. The acquisition is expected to close in April and is subject to the customary closing conditions. The terms of the acquisition are not being disclosed.


“Tripwire and nCircle have the opportunity to be a powerful and transformational combination in the rapidly changing security market,” said Jim Johnson, CEO of Tripwire. “Our combined solutions are uniquely positioned to align security posture with business objectives, a crucial step in making security and risk meaningful and actionable across the enterprise.”

In 2012, the two companies’ combined bookings were approximately $140 million; together they had over 500 employees and more than 7,000 customers in 96 countries. The combined company would have ranked among the largest security and vulnerability management companies in this competitive space, including IBM, EMC, Symantec and McAfee. Tripwire is highly profitable, with a customer base that includes nearly 50% of the Fortune 500.

“Security experts know that continuous monitoring — the process of finding and eliminating vulnerabilities before they can be exploited — is a foundational component of any security framework and the most cost effective way to reduce the risk of security breaches,” said Abe Kleinfeld, CEO of nCircle. “The combination of Tripwire and nCircle brings together the industry’s leading researchers and the broadest and deepest solutions for reducing risk.”

Today, cyber security is more than an IT problem. The convergence of security and risk now impacts the entire enterprise, and executives are demanding risk-based security solutions. Following the acquisition of nCircle, Tripwire’s combined solutions will enable senior security officers to make risk-based security decisions aligned with business priorities and goals.

In a Gartner Inc. report titled Meeting the Information Needs of the Chief Risk Officer in 2023, analysts Paul E. Proctor and Rob McMillan said: “Chief Risk Officers will have the benefit of an engaged executive team, but the challenge of a constantly shifting universe of risk to present and prioritize for stakeholders. To manage their responsibilities they will need new knowledge, tools and techniques for gathering, assessing and presenting information.”

"It’s difficult to mitigate attacks without understanding vulnerabilities and assessing that resources allocated to IT security are spent wisely,” said Charles Kolodgy, research vice president, security products at IDC. “Organizations must also be able to maintain an optimal security posture. The combined solutions will enable Tripwire to advance the state of the art in risk-based security management.”