Avast Acquires Majority Stake in AVG, Creating Security Powerhouse

Avast Software today announced it has acquired a majority stake in AVG Technologies. The two companies will begin acting as a single entity on Monday, October 3.

Forgive the pun, but this is a big deal. Avast claims the largest consumer-installed base in the world, with sizable business groups in mobile, SMB and enterprise mobile. Combined with AVG, the new company has more than 400 million users, more than 40 percent of global PCs excluding China and the largest consumer security installed base in the world, according to Vince Steckler, CEO of the new behemoth. In the U.S. alone, they have 58 million users.

Glenn Taylor, Chief of Staff and GM of SMB, Avast, told The VAR Guy that the deal is reflective of current trends in the market. “The SMB market is expected to grow moderately in the coming years, and the space is crowded,” he said. “We believe the increased scale gained from these two companies gives an unmatched global footprint, and will enable us to exceed the market growth expectations.  Avast is committed to being successful in the SMB market.”

The new entity will now have one of the largest network of sensors for threat detection, positioning it well to be the go-to security solution for the Internet of Things (IoT), especially in consumer applications. But Taylor says they have some work in front of them to align the two vendors’ offerings to their customer needs.

“One opportunity that comes from the increased scale is that in the security space, we have multiple products performing similar functions,” he says. “It’s important for us to harmonize those products and pull the best features into our future offerings to make it as easy as possible to do business with us, which will be a focus for us in the coming months.”

Partners won’t see any changes to their programs anytime soon. Taylor says that while the two channel programs will eventually merge, for now, the programs will continue unchanged.