Palo Alto Networks has acquired Bridgecrew for cloud security posture management (CSPM) and DevOps-related security capabilities. The deal is valued at $156 million in cash plus some replacement equity awards, subject to adjustments, the buyer says.
This is technology M&A deal number 125 that MSSP Alert and sister site ChannelE2E have covered so far today. See the entire technology M&A deal list here.
Bridgecrew offers an Infrastructure as Code (IaC) security platform for developers and DevOps. The proposed acquisition will enable Palo Alto Prisma Cloud to provide developers with security assessment and enforcement capabilities throughout the DevOps process, the buyer says.
Bridgecrew's software allows DevOps teams to identify infrastructure errors in cloud accounts, workloads, or infrastructure as code, according to the seller's website. Also, the software allows DevOps teams to embed cloud security directly into code reviews and build pipelines to prevent errors from being deployed, the website adds.
Bridgecrew Company Background, Executive Perspectives
Bridgecrew, founded in 2019, has a fledgling partner program -- though the company doesn't specifically market its software to MSPs or MSSPs (managed security services providers).
Bridgecrew raised $14 million in Series A funding in April 2020. Battery Ventures led the round with participation from NFX, the company’s $4 million seed investor. Sorensen Ventures, DNX Ventures, Tectonic Ventures, and Homeward Ventures also participated in the round.
In a prepared statement about the deal, Palo Alto Networks CEO Nikesh Arora said:
"Shift left security is a must-have in any cloud security platform. Developers don't want to wait until runtime to find out their security is not working, and the CISO charged with protecting the entire organization certainly values higher security from fixing issues earlier in the development lifecycle. We are thrilled to welcome Bridgecrew, and their widely adopted and trusted developer security platform, to Palo Alto Networks. When combined, Prisma Cloud customers will benefit from having security embedded in the very foundation of their cloud infrastructure."
Added Idan Tendler, co-founder and CEO of Bridgecrew:
"We have dedicated ourselves to building developer-first tools that bridge the gap between developers and cloud security. By joining Palo Alto Networks, we will be able to bring codified cloud security to the developer community on a wider scale. We look forward to working together to continue shifting cloud security left."
Palo Alto Networks Acquisitions List
After hiring Google veteran Nikesh Arora as CEO in mid-2019, Palo Alto Networks has maintained steady M&A activity.
Recent deals include acquiring:
- Expanse for attack surface management technology.
- The Crypsis Group for incident response consulting.
- CloudGenix for SD-WAN services.
- Aporeto, a company that provides a Zero Trust Cloud Security Platform and machine identity-based micro-segmentation.
- Zingbox, an Internet of Things (IoT) cybersecurity company.
- Twistlock for cloud container & VM cybersecurity.
- Demisto, a startup Security Orchestration, Automation and Response (SOAR) software provider for MSSPs.
- Compliance & risk management platform provider RedLock for $173 million.
Generally speaking, the deals align with Palo Alto Networks’ channel partner and MSSP initiatives — which have been accelerating. Still, we’re checking to see if The Crypsis Group deal potentially introduces some channel consulting partner conflicts.
