Google acquires Siemplify to strength cloud cybersecurity capabilities

The Israeli SOAR’s platform will be integrated into Google Cloud’s Chronicle. Deal is estimated at $500 million

Google acquires Siemplify to strength cloud cybersecurity capabilities

REUTERS/Annegret Hilse

Taking another step in amplifying its threat response and market presence, Google Cloud announced the acquisition of Israeli security orchestration, automation and response (SOAR) provider, Siemplify, on Tuesday. While financial details were not officially disclosed, multiple sources reported that the acquisition price is estimated at $500 million.

“In a time when cyberattacks are rapidly growing in both frequency and sophistication, there’s never been a better time to bring these two companies together,” said the official Google Cloud announcement. “We both share the belief that security analysts need to be able to solve more incidents with greater complexity while requiring less effort and less specialized knowledge.”

“We have found a remarkable partner in Google Cloud. A partner that truly shares our mission, vision, values and culture,” said Siemplify CEO, Amos Stern. “We could not be more excited to join forces with Google Cloud to drive innovation and help many more security teams take their operations to a whole new level.

Siemplify allows Security Operation Center analysts to manage their operations from end-to-end, respond to cyber threats with speed and precision, and get smarter with every analyst interaction. Its platform will be integrated into Google Cloud’s cybersecurity group Chronicle.

The company was founded in 2015 by Amos Stern, Alon Cohen, and Garry Fatakov, graduates of the IDF’s elite Intelligence Corps technological units. To date, Siemplify has raised $58 million. This is the first Israeli cybersecurity firm Google has acquired.

“Naturally, SOAR as a category did not yet exist, and as is often the case with startups, we had to keep innovating, working with customers and listening to the market,” said Stern.

Over the past two years, Google’s revenue from its cloud business has nearly doubled, to around $5 billion, as companies shifted to working from home due to the Covid-19 pandemic, reports Reuters.

Yet, it is still quite far from market leaders AWS, which generated over $45 billion in revenues in 2020 alone, and Microsoft’s 2021 Q3 results from its Intelligent Cloud business (which includes Azure), which amounted to $17 billion.  

In August 2021, Google pledged to invest $10 billion over the next five years to strengthen cybersecurity – including expanding zero-trust programs, helping secure the software supply chain, and enhancing open-source security. The company also committed to train 100,000 Americans in fields like IT Support and Data Analytics, learning in-demand skills including data privacy and security. 

Google’s biggest acquisition in Israel was in 2013, when it acquired Waze for a reported $1.1 billion. In 2019, it acquired Israeli cloud storage company Elastifile for an estimated $200 million, and data migration company Alooma for a reported $150 million.