Ankura, a business advisory and expert services firm, has acquired the managed detection and response (MDR) division of digital legal transformation company UnitedLex, according to a prepared statement. UnitedLex's founders and leaders will transition to Ankura as part of the transaction.
This is M&A deal number 223 that MSSP Alert and ChannelE2E have covered so far in 2020. See the complete M&A deal list here. Also, we've tracked this growing list of MSSP acquisitions.
In this particular deal, Ankura has integrated UnitedLex's MDR capabilities into its Cyber Adversary Threat and Compromise Hunting (CATCH) services, the company noted. In doing so, Ankura now provides an MDR offering that delivers:
- Threat hunting
- Security monitoring
- Managed endpoint detection and response (EDR)
- Managed security information and event management (SIEM)
- Security operations center-as-a-service (SOCaaS)
- Incident response and forensics
- Managed security and user behavior analytics
- Managed threat intelligence orchestration and operationalization
Ankura's MDR service leverages an organization's existing security tools and systems to address visibility gaps, the company said. That way, the service enables an organization to suppress cyber threats before they impact its everyday operations.
Demand for MDR Services Increasing
Along with Ankura's addition of UnitedLex's MDR capabilities, several cybersecurity companies recently have introduced new MDR services, including:
- Red Canary: Launched Red Canary MDR for Microsoft Defender Advanced Threat Protection (MDATP), which identifies and remediates cyber threats
- Cybereason: Announced a Mobile MDR service that uses big data and machine learning to provide insights into cyberattacks across an organization's devices and networks
- Involta: Released a global security monitoring and response solution in conjunction with Alert Logic that protects an organization's private and public IT infrastructure against cyberattacks
Global MDR revenues are expected to exceed $1.7 billion by 2022, according to industry analyst MarketsandMarkets. As such, cybersecurity companies may increasingly explore ways to capitalize on the MDR market in the years to come.
