Francisco
Partners, a leading global investment firm that specializes in
partnering with technology and technology-enabled businesses, today
announced it has closed on the previously announced acquisition of
Forcepoint from Raytheon Technologies. Forcepoint is
a leading provider of cybersecurity solutions that protects the
critical data and networks of thousands of customers throughout the
world.
Coinciding with the transaction close, the company's board of directors has appointed Manny Rivelo as
Chief Executive Officer (CEO) effective immediately. As CEO, Rivelo
will focus the company's strategy on accelerating enterprise and
government agency adoption of a modern approach to security that
embraces the emerging Secure Access Service Edge (SASE) architecture.
Forcepoint's SASE approach
recognizes solving today's most pressing security problems requires
tight integration of capabilities that cross traditional product
boundaries. It is cloud-native, end-user aware and powered by a
converged security platform, and available today through Forcepoint Cloud Security Gateway and Private Access.
"Cybersecurity
has never been more important for businesses and governments around the
world. As we continue to see broad-scale global attacks, the
cybersecurity industry needs to evolve to deliver security capabilities
to match those of today's sophisticated threat actors. Likewise, every
organization today needs to evolve its security posture to holistically
integrate cybersecurity across the entirety of its business operations
and culture. It can no longer be viewed as 'just an IT issue'," said
Rivelo. "I look forward to solidifying Forcepoint's leadership position
as the global cybersecurity partner of choice for enterprises and
government agencies."
Rivelo
joins Forcepoint with more than 30 years of experience across executive
leadership, product management, customer support and sales functions
with some of the world's leading security and information technology
companies. Previous executive roles held by Rivelo include Chief
Customer Officer at Arista Networks, President and CEO as well as
Executive Vice President, Security, Service Provider and Strategic
Solutions at F5 Networks, President and CEO of AppViewX, and various
senior leadership roles at Cisco Systems.
New Executive Appointments Strengthen Forcepoint as an Independent Entity
Forcepoint
also announced two new executive appointments that will further
strengthen the leadership team as the company becomes an independent
entity. These include Dave Stevens as Senior Vice President of Strategy and Execution and John DiLullo as Chief Revenue Officer (CRO). Additionally, Sean Berg has
been promoted to President of Global Governments and Critical
Infrastructure. Stevens, DiLullo, and Berg will all report to CEO Manny Rivelo.
As
Senior Vice President of Strategy and Execution, Stevens will support
the company's global go-to-market strategy and the expansion of
commercial technology opportunities. Stevens' prior executive leadership
roles include Chief Technology Officer at Brocade Communications
Systems, Co-Founder and CEO at Palo Alto Networks, and senior operating
roles at Rhapsody Networks, Atmosphere Networks, Nortel Networks, Bay
Networks, and SynOptics Communications.
As
Forcepoint CRO, DiLullo will be responsible for driving the company's
worldwide sales and business development organizations to accelerate
customer adoption and deployment of Forcepoint solutions globally. Prior
to Forcepoint, DiLullo served in executive leadership roles at
Lastline, F5 Networks and Aruba Networks.
In
his new position as President for Global Governments and Critical
Infrastructure, Berg will continue to lead the business unit's global
revenue and technology growth, including continued expansion of the
company's leadership in cross-domain and insider-threat security
segments. Berg joined the company in May 2017 as Vice President of Sales for Global Governments and in October 2017 named Senior Vice President and General Manager for the business unit.