Enterprise identity services company Okta has announced its acquisition of startup ScaleFT.
Financial terms of the acquisition were not disclosed, but known investment in ScaleFT since its foundation in 2015 totals $2.8 million.
“Companies have realized they can no longer trust their network and have to understand device security — instead of trusting everyone behind a firewall, now IT and security leaders must trust no one, inside or outside the organization,” said Frederic Kerrest, Okta’s co-founder and Chief Operating Officer. “To help our customers increase security while also meeting the demands of the modern workforce, we’re acquiring ScaleFT to further our contextual access management vision — and ensure the right people get access to the right resources for the shortest amount of time.”
ScaleFT’s solutions centre around zero trust security, with the company’s major offering being a comprehensive cloud-native platform which enables secure remote access without a VPN and unifies access controls across all user and resource types. It uses a form of behavioural analytics to assess each access request and re-evaluate ‘trust’.
Instead of trusting everyone behind a firewall, now IT and security leaders must trust no one, inside or outside the organization.
– Frederic Kerrest, COO and co-founder, Okta
While Okta already offers zero trust security solutions, it says that the acquisition will add additional device-centric capabilities, which will improve visibility and user experience.
“As an organization, 21st Century Fox is committed to giving our people access to best-in-class technology, and because of that, our technology strategy has to be a heterogeneous one. The Okta Identity Cloud helps our apps work together, gives us visibility and the ability to take action when we see suspicious behavior, and at the same time, provides our users with a delightful experience,” said Melody Hildebrandt, Global CISO at 21st Century Fox, which is one of Okta’s customers. “The investment Okta is announcing today underscores its deep commitment to empowering its partners with next generation tools and experiences for end-users.”
ScaleFT’s Paul Querna (CTO and co-founder, formerly Rackspace’s Principal Engineer & Director, Corporate Strategy & Development) and Marc Rogers (CSO, formerly Head of Information Security at Cloudflare) will be joining Okta’s team. Querna will lead strategy and execution of Okta’s Zero Trust architecture, while Rogers will become VP of Cybersecurity Strategy.
