BlackBerry in a recent move acquired Encription which offers services pertaining to cyber security. This move can offer the company a chance to leverage its intellectual property and software. Encription offers security and hardware technical consulting, white hat hacking services and penetration testing. The company conforms to the highest security standards in the United Kingdom. It also has ISO/IEC 27001 and CESG CHECK IT certifications.
The executive vice president of strategic planning and corporate development of the company, James Mackey, said that the company considers this as a natural extension to the services being currently offered by the company. Blackberry already offers white hat hacking services for its products. The only thing the company considered to be missing was to expand the practice externally.
Encription is based in Birmingham and has about 40 employees. The company has government customers and is a large enterprise. It works under the agreements of non-disclosure. There are currently 15 employees in BlackBerry who solely focus on internal security services. With the purchase of Encription, the company gets a chance to cross-sell its hardware and software services.
The following services would be offered by the company:
- Best practices and strategic security for mobility, IT operations and cloud management.
- Technical assistance for product security and infrastructure
- IoT and automotive security consulting
- Testing, analysis and detection services
The new cyber security unit would mirror the overall strategy of the company to lay focus on the industries being regulated. The terms of deal haven’t been disclosed by the company yet. BlackBerry has stated that the purchase of Encription may be a beginning of investment series in the field of security services. The company plans to hire more professionals having security background.
BlackBerry is trying to focus more on security software and services. The company has sensed immense potential in the area. The cyber security consulting has a worth of $16.5 billion globally. The terms of deal with Encription haven’t been disclosed by the company yet. The acquisition of the company is believed to trigger a series of cyber security and software services acquisitions by the company. During September 2015, BlackBerry made an agreement to take over Good Technology which was a rival company for $425 million. This deal occurred right after the acquisition of AtHoc which offered networked, secure crisis communications. BlackBerry is trying to boost its revenue from cyber security and software services. This is being done to offset the decline in its revenue from the smartphone unit.