Cisco Nets NetSift for $30M
Just a week after announcing the acquisition of eight-month-old M.I. Secure Corp. for $13 million, Cisco says it's paying $30 million in cash and stock options for NetSift Inc., a company just a year old and with 15 on staff (and, currently, a blank Website).
The deal is expected to close by the end of July, when NetSift, originally backed by Enterprise Partners Venture Capital, will become part of Cisco's Internet Systems Business Unit (see Cisco Buys Startup for $1.2M per Employee).
And in case your calculator's not working, that values NetSift, which is developing technology to automatically protect enterprise networks against new worm and virus attacks by generating unique signatures, at $2 million per employee. KACHINGGG!!!!
Among those 15 is at least one person with a track record of starting a company bought by Cisco. Board member Guru Parulkar founded switching fabric startup Growth Networks in 1998 and joined Cisco when his company was acquired by the routing giant in February 2000 for about $355 million in stock. He left in July 2001 to join the VC firm, New Enterprise Associates (NEA).
This is Cisco's third security-related acquisition this year, with FineGround Networks making up the trio with M.I. Secure and NetSift (see Cisco Chomps FineGround). Altogether, Cisco has announced seven acquisitions in 2005, the other firms being Sipura Technology Inc., Topspin Communications Inc., Airespace Inc., and chip firm Vihana Inc., another $30 million acquisition (see Cisco/Linksys Buys VOIP ATA Maker, Cisco Buys Topspin for $250M, and Cisco Buys Airespace).
— Ray Le Maistre, International News Editor, Light Reading
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NetSift, Inc. is a well-funded, early stage network security startup. We are pioneering a new approach to protecting enterprises from large-scale attacks such as worms, viruses, and DDOS. Our proprietary hardware implementation examines traffic at multi-Gigabit speeds to automatically detect and prevent an attack within seconds of its onset, as opposed to the days taken by security vendors today. We are looking for experienced and talented security engineers who will play a key role in establishing NetSift as the go-to vendor for the most accurate, timely, and actionable security alerts.
Job Responsibilities:
~ Develop, debug, document and reverse engineer exploits as they are discovered by NetSift solutions. Provide the further analysis and communication required to credibly interface with CERT, the Storm Center, and other responsible disclosure forums.
~ Translate new vendor vulnerability announcements into NetSift vulnerability signatures.
~ Work with cross-functional teams such as Product Management, Algorithm Designers, and Software & Hardware Engineers to develop new functional requirements for the NetSift solution based on knowledge of new and existing attack trends.
~ Work closely with the development team to design new paradigms for the next generation of intrusion detection and prevention solutions.
~ Help create a Security Operations Center that provides 24/7 security monitoring of various NetSift installations and enterprises.
JOB REQUIREMENTS
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~ BS in Computer Science or equivalent (MS preferred).
~ 4+ years experience with intrusion detection systems (NIDS preferred), signature creation and testing.
~ Strong programming skills in C, C++ and x86 assembly.
~ Extensive software reverse-engineering experience.
~ Deep knowledge of operating systems internals, with particular emphasis on Windows vulnerabilities.
~ Ability to disassemble 8086 code using standard tools like IDA Pro, SoftICE and GDB.
~ Solid understanding of networking fundamentals (TCP/IP) and protocols.
~ Extensive experience with protocol analysis and network traffic analysis.
~ Strong technical writing skills.
~ Experience with standard IDS and IPS tools such as Snort, NetScreen, ISS, McAfee, or TippingPoint a plus.
~ Contributions to Buqtraq or other responsible disclosure forums a plus.
CONTACT
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Please email resume to jobs_at_netsift.net
Steve Hunt
VP Engineering
NetSift Inc
jobs_at_netsift.net