CrowdStrike (Nasdaq: CRWD), one of the biggest cybersecurity companies in the US, is setting up a large Israeli R&D center based on a huge acquisition. The name of the Israeli company is set to be announced. Sources close to the matter have told "Globes" that CrowdStrike has been in talks to buy one or more Israeli companies. Several sources, who preferred not to be named, told "Globes" that CrowdStrike's acquisitions in Israel could be for as much as $2 billion.
CrowdStrike, which has a market cap of $39 billion, competes with some of Israel's largest and fastest growing cybersecurity companies like SentinelOne (NYSE: S) and Cybereason.
Such a deal will bring CrowdStrike into the heart of Israel's crowded cybersecurity arena, where it will compete with other US giants to hire graduates of Israel's intelligence units as well as Israel's major cybersecurity companies. CrowdStrike will not be the first US company to make a major move this year into Israel's cybersecurity industry. In January, Google acquired Israeli cybersecurity company Siemplify for $500 million after buying US company Mandiant, which has a development center in Israel. Microsoft already has a large cybersecurity center in Israel, focusing on cloud applications and Akamai and SalesForce also have centers in Israel focusing on cybersecurity.
CrowdStrike is already active in Israel through a sales office which markets its products to Israeli companies and through its Falcon Fund, which already has investments in three Israeli companies: cybersecurity automation company Cybersixgill, which develops technologies for automatically identifying phishing attacks, information leaks and malware; DoControl, which protects cloud applications and and provides organizations working with them with transparency for user's software; and Dig Security, which specializes in information for data establishments on remote cloud servers.
In 2020, CrowdStrike acquired US-Israeli startup Preempt Security, which is managed from the US but has a development center in Ramat Gan. Today that development center has 60 employees, most of them new employees hired over the past 18 months.
CrowdStrike was established in Austin Texas by CEO George Kurtz, Dmitri Alperovitch and Gregg Marston. Kurtz, who is Jewish, frequently visits Israel and was here several weeks ago, probably to help put together the imminent acquisitions and investments in the country. Alperovitch, who is also Jewish, immigrated with his parents from the Soviet Union to Canada and from there to the US.
CrowdStrike said, "We do not respond to rumors and speculation."
Published by Globes, Israel business news - en.globes.co.il - on July 26 2022.
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