Symantec Aims to Boost Mobility Portfolio With Acquisition of Nukona

Symantec today announced its plans to acquire Nukona, Inc., a privately-held provider of mobile application management (MAM) solutions.

Nukona’s technology enables IT administrators to protect and control iOS, Android and HTML5 apps by “wrapping” both native and web-based apps with a management layer, and allowing them to apply security policies without having to modify the applications.

The acquisition comes on the heels of Symantec’s acquisition of mobile device management (MDM) firm Odyssey Software earlier this month, and is a move to strengthen Symantec’s enterprise mobility portfolio by adding a mobile application protection component.

The combination of Odyssey’s MDM solution, which enables cross-platform mobile device management, with Nukona’s solution which helps distribute, secure and control mobile applications, will enable Symantec customers to secure enterprise mobile apps and data while managing and protecting them with policies, including authenticating users, encrypting sensitive files, preventing data leakage and selectively wiping corporate data.

“As the adoption of mobile devices and apps continues to grow at an unprecedented rate, one of the biggest challenges for customers is to protect and manage the native apps, data and environments of these devices,” said CJ Desai, senior vice president, Endpoint and Mobility Group, Symantec. “The acquisition of Nukona helps us further address the ‘Consumerization of IT’ and ‘Bring Your Own Device’ trends by helping organizations protect and isolate corporate data and applications across both corporate owned and personally owned devices.”

In addition, Symantec says its customers will have the ability to deploy cloud-based and on-premise enterprise app stores with Nukona’s technology, as well as maintain secure content libraries to protect and sync documents with reduced risk of data loss.

Subject to customary closing conditions, the transaction is expected to close in April. The financial terms of the acquisition were not disclosed.