McAfee announces new status as a standalone cybersecurity company

McAfee (the “Company”) has announced that it has begun operating as a new standalone company. As a standalone business, McAfee is one of the largest pure-play cyber-security firms. Built on the belief that “Together is Power,” the new McAfee will expand upon its leading security solutions platform to better enable customers to effectively identify and orchestrate responses to cyber-threats.

The launch of McAfee marks the closing of the previously announced investment by TPG and Intel Corporation (INTC) to establish a pure-play cyber-security company with access to significant capital, operational and technology resources. Additionally, McAfee announced that leading private equity investment firm Thoma Bravo has joined, as a minority investor in the Company, through an agreement with TPG. As previously announced, Intel is retaining a 49% equity stake in the new entity.

With the help of its new investment partners, McAfee will apply greater market focus, build its platform and target new financial, operational and technology investments to better address the cyber-security market’s significant global growth opportunity. Intel Senior Vice President and General Manager Chris Young will lead the new McAfee as Chief Executive Officer. TPG Partner Bryan Taylor has been named Chairman of the Board.

“Cyber-security is the greatest challenge of the connected age, weighing heavily on the minds of parents, executives and world leaders alike,” said Christopher Young, CEO of McAfee. “As a standalone company with a clear purpose, McAfee gains the agility to unite people, technology and organizations against our common adversaries and ensure our technology-driven future is safe.”

“We offer Chris Young and the McAfee team our full support as they establish themselves as one of the largest pure-play cyber-security companies in the industry,” said Brian Krzanich, Intel CEO. “Security remains important to Intel, and in addition to our equity position and ongoing collaboration with McAfee, Intel will continue to integrate industry-leading security and privacy capabilities in our products from the cloud to billions of smart, connected computing devices.”

“Since its founding, McAfee has been dedicated to offering its customers industry-leading cyber-security solutions,” said Bryan Taylor, Partner at TPG Capital and Chairman of the Board at McAfee. “Its ongoing commitment to product innovation, a rich partner ecosystem, and superior customer service has created a trusted brand that will thrive as a standalone entity. We look forward to working with the company and our partners to accelerate growth and continue building a leading cybersecurity platform that serves to protect customers in today’s changing environment.”

“McAfee is a global organization with a 30-year history and a brand known the world over for innovation, trust and collaboration. Given our years of focus on the security software sector, we see great opportunity for McAfee to continue to advance and innovate,” said Seth Boro, a Managing Partner at Thoma Bravo. “Our deep sector knowledge and history of helping build successful businesses will be an asset to the company, and we look forward to working with the management team and our colleagues at TPG and Intel to guide McAfee through its next chapter of growth.”

The New McAfee

The company also outlined a new strategic vision, focused on innovation, trust, and collaboration.

Innovation

McAfee represents more than 7,500 of the industry’s most talented cyber-security professionals, while holding more than 1,200 security technology patents and ongoing industry recognition for its products. McAfee is also home to McAfee Labs, one of the world’s leading sources for cyber-threat intelligence. McAfee’s people, technology and insights enable McAfee solutions to correlate real-world data collected from millions of sensors across key threat vectors and inform the next generations of McAfee product innovation.

Trust

From the moment the first worm was unleashed on the internet in 1988, to the massive 2016 Mirai distributed denial of service (DDoS) attack, the cyber-security industry has witnessed exponential growth in the volume and variety of cyber-threats. For the last three decades, McAfee has earned the trust of consumers, businesses and governments by delivering practical solutions to address these threats. Today, McAfee’s award winning products and solutions today protect more than 74.9 mn endpoints daily, including 87% of the world’s largest banks and Fortune 100 firms and more than 263 mn consumer endpoints.

Collaboration

McAfee believes in the power of working together—only when people, technology and organizations work together can we become safer. The McAfee Security Innovation Alliance, the industry’s premier technology partnering program, boasts more than 135 partners globally. Over the past year, more than 30 partners have integrated or planned integrations with the McAfee Data Exchange Layer (DXL), the industry-endorsed communication fabric providing real-time interaction between applications.

Goldman Sachs, & Co., Morgan Stanley & Co. LLC, RBC Capital Markets, and UBS Investment Bank served as financial advisors to TPG and Thoma Bravo, and Allen & Company LLC served as financial advisor to Intel. Ropes & Gray served as legal advisors to TPG, Skadden, Arps, Slate, Meagher & Flom LLP served as legal advisors to Intel, and Kirkland & Ellis served as legal advisors to Thoma Bravo.