Barracuda Networks Buys Intronis

Barracuda Networks, Inc. has entered into a definitive agreement to acquire privately-held Intronis, Inc., a company providing data protection solutions to MSPs, a growing channel delivering IT services to SMBs.

This acquisition is expected to expand Barracuda’s channel reach with the addition of nearly 2,000 MSPs and a purpose-built platform designed to streamline how MSPs service the data protection needs of their customers.

The transaction is expected to close in Barracuda’s fiscal third quarter.

“The Intronis team has built a strong reputation for delivering a platform that was designed to meet the evolving needs of MSPs. Barracuda and Intronis share a commitment to simplicity, customer experience, and the channel. We believe a larger opportunity exists to add Barracuda’s award-winning security and data protection solutions to the Intronis platform to expand its offerings. This will allow Intronis’ MSP partners to address the broader needs of their customers,” said BJ Jenkins, CEO and president, Barracuda. “Barracuda has a rich history of innovation – with our subscription services, SaaS offerings, and public cloud focus, and this transaction builds on those successes. It also allows us to expand our market reach, and to offer compelling IT solutions no matter how customers want to consume them.”

Organizations continue to explore ways to increase efficiencies in their IT infrastructure. According to CompTIA’s 4th Annual Managed Services Trends Survey, there is a growing number of customers looking to MSPs to procure, deploy, and manage their IT initiatives. Specifically, 72% of respondents use an MSP for backup/DR initiatives, while 68% rely on their MSP for their Security initiatives.

At the same time, a growing number of traditional VAR partners are embracing the MSP model as a platform to better address the requirements of their customers. With the addition of Intronis, Barracuda will be better positioned to address these requirements with its simplified pricing, delivery and support platform that makes it easier for MSPs to manage their customers’ network, security and data protection needs.

Additional highlights include:

• Purpose-Built MSP Platform – Intronis’ growth in the MSP market is driven by its ECHOplatform, which many of its MSP partners use as the foundation of their managed services business, and traditional VARs have used to accelerate their transition into becoming MSPs. Integrated with the major Professional Services Automation (PSA) and Remote Monitoring and Management (RMM) providers, the ECHOplatform enables MSPs to deploy and manage data protection services for their end customers with comprehensive reporting, centralized account management, and consolidated billing.
• Expanded Customer Opportunity – Research from Markets and Markets (Managed Services Market, Market Forecast and Analysis, January 2015) finds that the annual growth rate of the SMB managed services market will exceed 20% over the next five years. Intronis’ technology and processes deliver an efficient way to better reach those customers, providing the ability for Barracuda to accelerate growth in this market.
• Extended Channel Reach – Intronis’ MSP experience and infrastructure expand Barracuda’s channel reach in the newer, growing MSP partner segment. This includes the nearly 2,000 MSPs that partnr with Intronis today, of which less than 10% overlap with existing active Barracuda partners. Further, many key elements of the managed services market are forecast to grow at double-digit rates according to Gartner (Forecast Overview: Public cloud Services, Worldwide, 2011-2016, 8 February 2013), representing opportunities for MSPs to support their clients’ cloud migration plans and their IT service deployment, management and security needs. Barracuda’s security and data protection products, including Barracuda’s Office 365 offerings, can be adapted over time to take advantage of the current Intronis channel, as well as enable international expansion of the current Intronis offerings.

“We’ve invested heavily in developing and maintaining strong relationships with our MSP channel, which is reinforced by our platform designed to simplify how our partners manage their offerings,” said Rick Faulk, CEO, Intronis. “We are looking forward to working with the Barracuda team as part of the dedicated MSP business to further drive Intronis to the next phase of our growth as we begin to expand our MSP footprint internationally and increase our ability to bring a broader suite of technology products and services to our MSP partners.“

With its focus on the MSP channel since 2009, Intronis has grown to service the needs of nearly 2,000 MSP partners who manage the IT requirements for more than 36,000 customers. Intronis partners rely on the combination of its centralized management portal, PSA and RMM integrations, simplified pricing structure, as well as its partner support to simplify their data protection and management infrastructure.

“As a long-standing partner of Intronis and Barracuda, we have always appreciated both companies’ commitment to our success,” said Eric Janson, president, Parallel Edge. “Intronis’ focus on simplifying how I deliver solutions ensures that I am efficiently providing high quality services to my customers, and Barracuda’s comprehensive, easy-to-use portfolio allows me to address a broad set of customer challenges, efficiently and cost effectively. I believe this combination will further help partners like us create new opportunities to serve the IT needs of our customers even more effectively as we expand our business.”