Cisco has announced that it plans to acquire Isovalent, a cloud-native security and networking startup. The purchase price was not disclosed. One of Isovalent’s key open-source technologies is eBPF, which provides developers with deep insight into the operating system layer. Cilium and Tetragon are other open-source projects created by Isovalent that give visibility into cloud-native applications and security components.
Tom Gillis, senior VP and general manager of Cisco’s Security Business Group, stated that these elements were previously provided by a hardware appliance but are now increasingly software-driven. He emphasized the importance of eBPF and Cilium in providing visibility for the cloud world, allowing for detailed insights into application interactions and security inspection.
Cilium is the default connectivity and security piece for Google Kubernetes Engine, Google Anthos, and Amazon EKS Anywhere. It is also being used by Adobe, Bell Canada, Capital One, Datadog, Palantir, IKEA, and Sky, among other large enterprises.
Cisco’s decision to acquire Isovalent could potentially concern the communities and large companies that use Isovalent’s popular open-source projects. However, Gillis believes that it’s in everyone’s best interest for the open-source pieces to thrive as a standard going forward.
Jeetu Patel, executive vice president and general manager of security and collaboration at Cisco, emphasized the need for companies to work together in the security market, highlighting open source as a model for co-innovation.
Cisco’s familiarity with Isovalent predates the acquisition announcement, as Cisco participated in the company’s $29 million Series A in 2020 and its $40 million Series B in 2022. This acquisition represents Cisco’s 11th acquisition and its fifth related to security this year. The biggest of these acquisitions was the $28 billion Splunk deal announced in September.
The deal is expected to close by the second quarter of next year.
