Juniper buys two start-ups

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By Marguerite Reardon
Staff Writer, CNET News.com




Juniper Networks announced on Tuesday that it plans to spend about $469 million to acquire two start-ups. The company will acquire Peribit Networks, which makes technology that optimizes wide-area network connections, in a deal valued at around $337 million in cash, stock and assumed stock options. The company will also acquire Redline Networks, a maker of Web acceleration technology, in a deal worth approximately $132 million in cash and assumed stock options.

This latest acquisitions will help Juniper play more aggressively in the enterprise market, where its rival Cisco Systems has dominated. The new technologies from the start-ups will help Juniper's business customers access information more quickly and securely, the company said.

"Juniper Networks is capitalizing on its leadership position to redefine the networking market," Scott Kriens, chairman and CEO of Juniper Networks said in a statement. "The addition of application acceleration technologies to Juniper Networks' best-in-class routing and security solutions is a natural extension of our traffic processing strategy. We are raising the bar on what users can and should expect from the network."


Specifically, Peribit's technology will be useful in corporate networks with branch offices because it will allow workers in these remote locations to access information at headquarters at the same speed as those who are actually working at headquarters.

Technology from Redline will also improve network performance. Redline's products sit in data centers between load balancers and Web servers. The products help ease the burden on Web servers by off-loading traffic, thereby reducing the number of connections those servers have to handle.

The Peribit Networks acquisition is expected to close in the third quarter of 2005, and the Redline Networks acquisition is expected to close in the second quarter of 2005.

The combined revenue for both Peribit Networks and Redline Networks was approximately $40 million in 2004, the company said. Last month, Juniper announced it would buy Kagoor Networks for $67.5 million in cash to expand its portfolio of carrier products