Thales Announces Imperva Acquisition

Thales has officially completed the acquisition of Imperva sooner than anticipated, originally projected for early 2024. The amalgamation results in a global cybersecurity powerhouse boasting over 5,800 experts spread across 68 countries and an estimated €2.4 billion in cybersecurity revenue by 2024, encompassing both civil and defense activities with anticipated double-digit growth thereafter. In India, the integration of Imperva brings approximately 100 specialized employees in software engineering development and customer success management to Thales. This strategic move aligns with the value creation goals communicated in July 2023 during the acquisition announcement, promising significant benefits for Thales' shareholders. Furthermore, the Digital Identity and Security (DIS) sector within Thales will experience a noteworthy profile enhancement, accompanied by new financial targets for 2027, including organic sales growth of +6 to +7% and a 2027 EBIT margin of 16.5%.

Patrice Caine, Chairman and Chief Executive Officer of Thales, said: “The acquisition of the US company Imperva is an important day for Thales, as it marks a new step in the expansion of our global cybersecurity capabilities for enterprises and governments around the world. We are very excited to welcome the Imperva teams to Thales. The combination of our entities’ values and our joint commitment to a future of trust will create significant synergies, business opportunities, and major market innovations. With ever-increasing cyber threats against business and government digital infrastructure, Thales is now uniquely positioned to help customers protect the heart of their digital ecosystem: applications, data, and identities.”

Data-centric security spanning across Applications, Data, and Identities

Thales and Imperva join forces to assist customers in navigating the swiftly escalating challenges of cybersecurity, marked by heightened frequency, severity, and complexity. Together, they offer the most comprehensive solutions, spanning a wide spectrum of application, data security, and identity use cases. The anticipated substantial growth in these three interconnected market segments is underscored by analysts' projections, forecasting a global end-user spending of approximately $20 billion in 2024. This collaboration positions Thales and Imperva at the forefront of addressing evolving cybersecurity needs, providing cutting-edge solutions to meet the demands of an ever-changing digital landscape.

Incorporating Imperva into its fold, Thales presents an augmented cybersecurity portfolio, featuring a synergistic blend of solutions designed to assist customers in securing applications, data, and identities throughout their complete digital ecosystem.

⦁ Application Security:

Comprehensive safeguarding for all applications and APIs, whether in the cloud, on-premises or within a hybrid framework. This industry-leading suite comprises a Web Application Firewall (WAF), Distributed Denial of Service attack (DDoS) Protection, Advanced Bot Protection, Application Programming Interface (API) Security, a developer-friendly Content Delivery Network (CDN), and Runtime Application Self-Protection (RASP).

⦁ Data Security:

Ensuring protection and governance over access to sensitive data, whether it's at rest, in motion, or in active use. The suite of products encompasses the CipherTrust Data Security Platform, Imperva Data Security Fabric, along with the Luna and payShield Hardware Security Modules—frequently employed as the foundation of trust for cryptographic operations.

⦁ Identity & Access Management:

Effortless, secure, and reliable access to applications and digital services for customers, employees, and partners is achieved through the product suite, featuring the OneWelcome Identity Platform and SafeNet Trusted Access.

“As a long-standing partner of both Thales and Imperva, we at Exclusive Networks are delighted with the combination of two companies that we know and value,” said Jesper Trolle, CEO of Exclusive Networks. “This acquisition marks a key step in Thales’ ambition to become a global leader in cybersecurity, reinforcing its strength in data security and expanding into the buoyant application security market. With this new combined value proposition, Thales will be uniquely positioned to offer even more innovative and effective solutions to address the growing security and compliance challenges faced by organizations around the world.”

Marking Thales' ninth acquisition in the digital security domain within the last nine years, this stands as the second-largest in the Group's history, following the acquisition of Gemalto, a global digital security leader. Following the successful integration of Tesserent, a prominent figure in Australian cybersecurity, along with S21sec and Excellium, both major players in European cybersecurity consulting, integration, and managed services, and OneWelcome, a leading European entity in Customer Identity and Access Management, the inclusion of Imperva within Thales will strategically position the Group's cybersecurity division among the top 5 global leaders in the cybersecurity domain.

Annually, Thales allocates €4 billion to Research and Development, with €1 billion being self-financed. The company is dedicated to bolstering Imperva's customer base and enhancing its solutions through an expedited innovation process. As a pioneering force, Thales holds a portfolio of 20,000 patents, with over 50% focused on critical technologies encompassing AI, generative artificial intelligence, cybersecurity, big data, the cloud, augmented reality, and quantum technologies.