arkoon

Arkoon announces 16% growth in group turnover in H1 2011

Schroeder — 2011-07-19T09:04:00Z

ROBUST GROWTH IN GROUP TURNOVER
ARKOON NETWORK SECURITY Group posted strong growth in turnover in the first half of 2011, with an increase of 16% compared with the year-earlier period. This growth represented a continuation of the favourable trend enjoyed in H2 2010, when ARKOON standalone turnover rose 13% compared with H2 2009.
Turnover (in € 000) H1 2011 H1 2010 Growth
ARKOON NETWORK SECURITY 4,602 4,063 +13.3%
SKYRECON SYSTEMS 646 477 +35.6%
Total Group 5,248 4,540 +15.6%
Turnover is shown excluding intra-group sales of products and services.

ALL BUSINESSES POSTED GROWTH
During the first half, ARKOON NETWORK SECURITY’s turnover advanced by 13.3% to €4,602K, vs. €4,063K in H1 2010:

Growth in the “FAST” network security business was driven by version 5 and new product launches. Over the six-month period, this business expanded by 11% (up 25% in billings) and contributed €3,193K to total turnover. Growth was particularly robust in the sale of UTM appliances, which surged 40.4% demonstrating that the launch of new models has injected new vitality into the business.

The “Security box” data protection business continued to see robust growth, posting an increase
of 18.9% to €1,408K, vs. €1,185K in H1 2010. The position of this business vis-à-vis large, longstanding
customers was strengthened.
Other operating revenue (intra-group sales and services) totalled €336K vs. €350K in the year-earlier period, bringing ARKOON’s total turnover to €4,938K vs. €4,413K over the first half of 2010.
Recurrent turnover from maintenance contracts, software updates and subscriptions to security services amounted to 51% of the total. Unearned revenue representing contract invoicing not recognised in first-halfturnover totalled €3,581K, up €602K over the period.
The portion of turnover deriving from abroad was up 14.8% from the first half of 2010.
These trends are expected to continue into the second half, which points to a significant increase in turnover for the full year.

SUCCESSFUL TURNAROUND AT SKYRECON
SKYRECON SYSTEMS was a driver behind the growth in turnover at ARKOON NETWORK SECURITY. This
subsidiary is in a redeployment phase; in H1 2011 its turnover grew by 35.6% to €646K and its invoicing
climbed by 41%.
Including invoicing for intra-group services of €109K vs. €218K in H1 2010, SKYRECON’s total turnover was €755K.
The action taken to inject fresh growth into SKYRECON’s StormShield endpoint software protection suite is paying off, with licence sales having tripled over the period. Alongside this growth, operating expenses were reduced by 40% between 2010 and 2011, indicating that a significant improvement in first-half earnings is in store.
VERY SOUND BALANCE SHEET STRUCTURE
As of 30 June 2011, the financial structure of ARKOON NETWORK SECURITY was sound, with stable equity,
cash of €4,082K and treasury net of financial debt of €1,766K, up €371K over the period.

IMPROVEMENT EXPECTED IN 2011 EARNINGS
In 2009 and 2010, the company took advantage of slower business conditions to concentrate on longer-term strategy and on developing technology around its “Security-as-a-Service” concept. This enabled it to return to growth and firm up its position as a major player in the field of security.
2011 should see a clear turnaround, with a significant rise in turnover and earnings over the full year, both at ARKOON and its subsidiary SKYRECON.
Earnings in 2011 should see the benefits of initiatives to lower structural costs throughout the group.
In addition, the company will be able to count on a contribution from recently launched products and services:
− P series FAST 360 UTM appliances,
− Smart SSL: secure access service for mobile workstations, including those not controlled by the
enterprise,
− Security Box for SharePoint V2.0 to make SharePoint environments secure,
− StormShield Server Side Edition: Windows server security (anti-intrusion),
and from numerous products and services related to virtualisation, online security services and cloud infrastructure security solutions.
The above figures were audited by the Statutory Auditors and presented to the company’s Supervisory
Board on 18 July 2011.
Next publication: H1 2011 earnings on 27 September 2011

Q2 2010 spams highlights by Commtouch

Virginie — 2010-07-19T09:21:55Z

Our partner Commtouch (UTM FAST360 Anti-spam provider) provides his Internet Threats Trend Report Q2 2010:

Q2 2010 Highlights:

179 billion
Average daily spam/phishing emails sent
Pharmacy ads
Most popular spam topic (64.4% of spam)
307,000 Zombies
Daily turnover
India
Country with the most zombies (13%)
Streaming media/Downloads
Most popular blog topic on user-generated content sites
Pornography/Sexually Explicit
Website category most likely to be compromised with malware
1811 variants
Of Mal/Bredo malware emailed

Know More? Whole report is available inside Arkoon Security Center

Netletter - June 2010

Virginie — 2010-06-22T14:44:13Z

JUNE 2010

	StormShield is coming to you: (...)
	Information protection reinforced (...)
	Stay connected with SkyRecon
	Arkoon's international news and (...)
	The Arkoon Group will be on the IT (...)
	The Arkoon 2010 Tour de France: (...)

As summer begins, I have the pleasure of presenting our new Netletter, which now consolidates the news of both Arkoon and its subsidiary SkyRecon. Since the beginning of the year 2010 our business activities have been organized into two Business Units: one, Network Security, is built around our FAST360 Solutions, whereas the other handles our software activities (Security BOX and StormShield) and operates under the SkyRecon brand. This type of organizational structure allows us to focus our R&D and sales efforts on each product line while developing synergies between the product lines; marketing synergies benefiting our partners and clients and synergies in the solutions. The positive effects of this will be experienced by you in the near future. So, in spite of some unfavorable industry trends in 2009 and a lackluster economy in 2010, we are steadfastly continuing with our plan to become a European player in the field of SSI and confidence. In this fast evolving market, we are more attentive than ever to your needs in an effort to provide solutions that rise to the level of your challenges.

Thierry Rouquet – Chairman of the Board and General Manager

> StormShield is coming to you: discover the Personal Edition version now!

StormShield(r) Personal Edition is a free security software application developed from SkyRecon's industry-leading professional solution, that provides protection against major risks in Internet browsing and attacks against the operating system and applications.

Based on an intelligent detection mechanism and not on traditional signature-based technology, StormShield(r) Personal Edition is capable of detecting any (new) program with abnormal behavior on a PC and instantly blocking it before it is executed. Viruses, spyware, Trojan horses, and other malicious code attacks are blocked. Your sensitive personal information remains protected on your computer.

Primary protection functions:

Vulnerability protection: protects your computer against any attempt to take advantage of a software vulnerability.
Keylogging protection: blocks keylogging software before it is launched on your computer.
Registry protection: blocks one of the primary means of operating system corruption.
Activity logs: monitors operations taking place on your computer.

Download StormShield(r) Personal Edition and surf the Internet with total peace of mind.

> Information protection reinforced with Security BOX Enterprise 7.2

The new version of Security BOX Enterprise encryption solution is now available!

Security BOX Enterprise ensures the confidentiality of data shared, stored or exchanged via e-mail clients. With its new audit engine and features for transparent collaborative encryption, Security BOX Enterprise 7.2 optimizes the protection of sensitive information available on desktop computers and on local networks.

For example, users are automatically warned when involuntary decryption of data occurs. All encrypted data copies or transfers from the Windows Explorer environment are now controlled and it is now possible to enforce data encryption safeguarding.

Versions 7.2 of the administration consoles of both Security BOX Manager and Authority Manager also bring major improvements in terms of ergonomics, deployment of configurations by mail or administrative database management.

Would you like to learn more about Security BOX Enterprise 7.2 or to see a demonstration? Please contact us!

> Stay connected with SkyRecon

Follow malware news on Twitter

> Arkoon's international news and events

Matrix Global Partners, Inc. (Matrix), SkyRecon's exclusive distributor for the Americas market

Matrix is continuing to develop its reseller network in the United States and Canada.
Matrix recently signed a distribution contract with Katz, Sapper & Miller Business Technology (KSMBT). KSMBT, the technology arm of an audit and consulting firm, is going to recommend and deploy StormShield among its clients and offere a full range of installation, customization and support services.
Matrix and its resellers have successfully completed a number of customer StormShield pilots, specifically with a branch of the United States government.

The Italian agency is acquiring a new asset

Arkoon is pleased to announce that Pier Carlo Devoti has joined the company on April 5th, 2010 in the position of Country Manager for Italy.
Pier Carlo has growth a 15 years experience in the IT Security market, helping international companies grow their presence in Italy; before joining Arkoon, Pier Carlo has worked with Symantec, Cyberguard, Secure Computing, McAfee.

> The Arkoon Group will be on the IT event of the year: Security Outlooks

The Arkoon Group will use this event to announce new products that are the latest examples of Arkoon’s innovation:

FAST360 Virtual Edition Web&Mail makes it possible to combine a physical appliance with virtualized security services on a proxy server in a VMware environment
Stormshield Personal Edition, the "standalone" version of StormShield, a workstation security solution
Security BOX for Microsoft(r) SharePoint(r) protects all data stored and shared on Microsoft servers

> The Arkoon 2010 Tour de France: meetings that are anything but virtual!

The Tour stopped in seven cities hosting meetings with our reseller partners and end user clients for the FAST360 appliance line from May 26 to June 9.
The exchanges, which we hope were beneficial to our audience, focused on trends in UTM, firewalls, and, of importantly, security service virtualization.
Arkoon’s R&D team, the Client Support Department, the Pre-sales Division, the Marketing and Sales Force, and all contacts of the Network Security Business Unit were made available to provide information, field questions, and resolve any problems.

	CONTACT US !
	» Arkoon - 69009 Lyon » Tel : +33 (0)4 72 53 01 01 » info@arkoon.net » SkyRecon Systems - 75009 Paris » Tel : +33 (0)1 73 54 02 50 » info@skyrecon.com		» Arkoon Network Security » SkyRecon Systems » FAST360 » Security BOX » StormShield

Q1 2010 spams highlights by Commtouch

Virginie — 2010-04-19T10:51:25Z

Our partner Commtouch (UTM FAST360 Anti-spam provider) provides his Internet Threats Trend Report Q1 2010:

SpamAssassin Y2K10 Bug: SpamAssassin users started the quarter and the new decade with numerous false positives due to a bug in the open source software Page.

CNN redirect used by scammers: An ad-serving HTML tag was exploited, directing unsuspecting users to a workfrom-home scam.

Service Providers must deal with Zombies: A proposed Internet Industry code of conduct raises the issue of outbound spam.

How much spam comes from gmail.com? - The Gmail domain is the most abused by spammers who fake the“from” field in spam emails – but real Gmail accounts are also being used to send spam.

How phishers get free Web hosting: A look at the Web categories most likely to be hosting a hidden phishing page.

Delivery invoices and etickets: An analysis of the most common subjects used in emails carrying malware as well as common malware functionality

Analyzing Spam Templates:

Know More? Whole report is available inside Arkoon Security Center

Success of the capital increase, Finalisation of the acquisition of SkyRecon Systems

Arkoon — 2009-11-13T09:00:00Z

ARKOON Network Security announces the success of the reserved capital increase which took place between 30th October to 9th October.

This capital increase allows ARKOON Network Security to acquire 100% of SkyRecon Systems shares, a company specialising in Intelligent Endpoint Security.

This acquisition amounts to €2,495,705 for the basic price which could be completed by a sum ranging from 0 to €2,218,404 to be determined in 2010 depending on both companies’ turnover levels in FY 2009.

Success of the reserved capital increase

The Board, meeting on 10th November 2009, observed that the company’s capital stock rose from €4,714,110 to €5,491,228 by the creation and issue of 777,118 new shares with a face value of €1 with an issue premium of €1,554,236, i.e. a unit share price of €3.

For this operation, the financial investment company, VENTECH takes a 9% stake in ARKOON’s capital.

Appointment of Ventech as a new member of the Supervisory Board

In compliance with the decision taken by the Mixed General Meeting dated 30th October 2009, the VENTECH company is appointed as new member of the ARKOON Network Security Supervisory Board for a period of six years. VENTECH will be represented on the board by Ms Claire Houry.

Thierry ROUQUET, Chairman of the Board, declared: “We are happy to welcome the Ventech company as one of our reference shareholders and are convinced that our different experiences will allow us to steer through other projects. We are particularly satisfied to welcome SkyRecon Systems within our Group. ARKOON Network Security thus secures the means to assert its position as a major player in endpoint security solutions: network, communication, data and workstation protection” .

Commtouch Weighs in on Industry-wide Phishing Debate

Virginie — 2009-10-20T13:01:53Z

For the second quarter in a row, there were spikes in email-borne viruses not caught by major antivirus engines, differentiating these last two quarters from rather consistently low numbers seen during the previous 18 months.

Q3 2009 Highlights:

Email-borne malware that bypassed traditional anti-virus engines peaked
every 11 to 13 days during the second half of the quarter, dominated by Mal-Bredo A and Mal
Behav-340, of which over 10,000 distinct variants were distributed.
An average of 332,000 zombies were newly activated each day for the purpose of malicious activity.
Spam levels averaged 83% of all email traffic throughout the quarter,peaking at 97% in July and bottoming out at 71% in August.
Sites in the "Health & Medicine" and "Sex Education" categories topped the list of Web categories
manipulated by phishing schemes.
"Business" continued to be the Web site category most infected with malware.
The financial crises and the debate around health care reform in the US has shaped recent spam trends.

Find whole Commtouch report on the Arkoon Security Center.

ARKOON announces a takeover deal for SkyRecon Systems

Virginie — 2009-09-25T08:36:20Z

Lyon, September 21, 2009 - ARKOON announces today that an agreement has been signed with a view to acquiring the company SkyRecon Systems, a software publisher specialized in Intelligent Endpoint Security.

SkyRecon’s StormShield technology, directly integrated in the endpoint operating system, offers a radically new approach to protect organizations using a single-client to mitigate all endpoint-related risks: software vulnerabilities, theft or loss of critical data, inappropriate use of personal applications,unauthorized connectivity, software attacks and intrusions, internal breaches.

From its inception, the SkyRecon offer was designed in an integrated manner to streamline the choice,deployment and administration of functionalities required for endpoint protection: anti-malware and anti-intrusion protection, anti-virus and anti-spyware, control of removable devices, data encryption, application control, wireless security and network access control.

In 2008, SkyRecon Systems generated a turnover of approximately €2m and employs a 27-strong workforce to date.

With this acquisition, following the MSI takeover in 2006, ARKOON Network Security endows itself with the means to consolidate its position as a major player on the security solutions market: network,communication, data and endpoint protection. It will also strengthen its foothold in the mid-market and key account customer segments through its network of partners.

The details of this acquisition will be published once this transaction has been finalized, an event scheduled for the end of October 2009.

New Trojan Variants Stump Most Major AV Engines

Virginie — 2009-07-23T12:50:34Z

As Commtouch, Arkoon technology partner, report:

The major news of the second quarter was the massive rise in email-borne viruses not caught by major anti-virus engines. One explanation for the dramatic rise is the appearance of aggressive new variants of several different Trojans. Anti-virus companies have been unable to produce new signatures in time to protect their customers. Some companies try to develop generic signatures, but these have proven ineffective in an outbreak of this size.

Throughout the quarter, there was an increase in the number and complexity of legitimate sites hijacked by hackers. Once-popular image spam also made a comeback this quarter with new tactics to bypass some anti-spam engines.

Another popular tactic this quarter was the use of current events to appeal to the emotional senses of recipients around the world. Global events including the death of pop superstar, Michael Jackson, and the spread of the swine flu were popular spam subjects.

Q2 2009 Highlights:

Spammers and malware distributers used current events including the Swine Flu epidemic and death of Michael Jackson to spread their messages.
Sites in the “Health” and “Web-based email” categories topped the list of Web categories manipulated by phishing schemes.
“Business” was the Web site category most infected with malware.
An average of 376,000 zombies were newly activated each day for the purpose of malicious activity.
Image-based spam returned with new tactics foregoing MIME-format standards to bypass some anti-spam engines.
Spam levels averaged 80% of all email traffic throughout the quarter, peaking at 97% in April and bottoming out at 64% in June.
Brazil continues to produce the most zombies, responsible for 17.5% of global zombie activity.

Whole Commtouch report is available on Arkoon Security Center.

Activity – 1st half 2009

Virginie — 2009-07-16T12:45:04Z

In an extremely difficult economic environment marked by a reduction in IT investment, the turnover of ARKOON Network Security decreased to €4,829K.
This change can be explained by two main factors:

Activity outside France fell sharply from €527K as of 30 June 2008 to €107K as of 30 June 2009;
Italian and Spanish markets being particularly affected by the crisis.
Network Security sales (UTM appliances and security services) amounting to €3,302K (vs.
€4,016K as of 30 June 2008) has been more severely affected by the current economic situation
than Data Security (Security BOX) sales which stood up well at a figure of €1,526K, showing
slight growth (+ 0.4%).

Over the period, Network Security accounted for 68% of total sales and Data Security for 32%.
Professional Services stood up well reaching a figure of €470K.

It should be noted that the Company made its first "Touch & Go" OEM sales which amounted to €116K
for the period.

Increase in recurring revenue

Deferred revenue (unearned revenue) was up slightly at €4,196K vs. €4,142K as of 31 December last.
Sales linked to maintenance contracts and subscriptions continued to perform well reaching €2,723K vs €2,518K as of 30 June 2008, a rise of 8.1%. This recurring revenue linked to the excellent renewal rate
for maintenance contracts, achieved to the detriment of equipment renewals (economic climate effect),has set part of the sales figure on a secure footing.

A very sound balance sheet with financing capability preserved

In this difficult climate, ARKOON Network Security has endeavoured to preserve its financial balance.
The financial structure of ARKOON Network Security as of 30 June 2009 was sound, with capital in the
region of €12M, available cash of €6M and financial debt amounting to less than 4% of its capital.

Continued conservative strategy and confidence in the future

To get through the current period and reinforce its position among the principal IT security publishers,
ARKOON Network Security is placing emphasis on its technological and commercial performance. As a
result, significant progress was made during the first half of the year:

Version 2.2 of Security BOX Mobile, a communicating Smartphone and PDA security package,
was successfully launched last March.
The Appliances Network Processor (ANP) range was expanded to include a Small-250 version
directed towards the small & medium business segment.
A new distribution agreement was signed with D2B Informatique. This agreement comes in
addition to those already concluded with a dense network of security expert partners.
ARKOON Network Security and SOPHOS have joined forces to undertake a "Tour de France" to
meet with their retailer and integrator partners.

And, to coordinate and maintain local relations with the network of partners (distributors, retailers
and operators, etc.), three new sales representatives have been recruited for the South, Rhône-
Alpes and Ile-de-France/North regions. During July, ARKOON Network Security will also be
taking on two other sales staff who will be directly in charge of major account customers with a
strong focus on the Security BOX offering.

With its sound fundamentals and robust financial structure, ARKOON Network Security is still on the
lookout for acquisition opportunities that would enable it to reinforce its offering and acquire new
technology.
2009 half-yearly results will be published on 15 September 2009 after close of trading.

Arkoon launches Small-250

Virginie — 2009-05-11T09:02:01Z

ARKOON completes its range of Network Processor Appliances (NPA) with the launch of the Small-250, adding to its range of Small and Medium Business (SMB) products.

With this new appliance, Arkoon meets the security, integration, and performance requirements of small and medium businesses, whilst also providing an efficient solution to meet the requirements of the remote sites of large businesses.

Following in the example of other NPA range products, the Small-250 comprises a Cavium Octeon multicore processor, designed for network use. This architecture enables the Small-250 to reach a application FAST and VPN speed of over 100 Mbps (250 Mbps in Firewall mode), guaranteed to meet the requirements of SMBs with up to 100 users.

With 3 GB interfaces and a Fast-Ethernet port, the Small-250 can integrate into the most exacting architectures (redundancy of Wan links, multiple DMZ, Clusters) thereby guaranteeing an optimal level of security and availability.

Fitted with a high-capacity (32 GB) Solid-State Drive (SSD) flash technology disk, the Small-250 has a particularly high MTBF, whilst optimizing the functionalities related to the processing of local data.

With a recommended general public retail price of less than €2000 (ex VAT), the Small-250 will be available from 15 May 2009. Its price/performance/quality ratio is amongst the best on the market, and this new product will enable Arkoon Network security to reinforce its position as a leading provider of security services and solutions for Enterprises and Management Security Services Providers (MSSP).