WithSecure has sold its open-source data collection product and business to Patria for an undisclosed amount. Ten employees will also move to Patria, which is opening an office in Oulu, Finland. The business will transfer on October 1st, 2024.
Antti Koskela, CEO and President, WithSecure, said, “This is a win-win-win situation where we sharpen our focus on the Elements portfolio. Further, the data collection product and business can further develop within a well-resourced company, and Patria strengthens its cyber business area by acquiring a product and business related to open source data collection.”
Who is Patria?
Patria is a defence and technology company operating in the aerospace and military markets. Its products include intelligence gathering and surveillance. The Finnish government holds the majority (50.1%) of the shares in the company, with Norwegian Kongsberg Defence & Aerospace as the other shareholder (49.9%).
In 2023, the company reported net sales of €733.8 million. For the first half of 2024, it reported sales of €375 million. New orders for H1 2024 are €737.9 million, up 75% year-on-year.
Patria is acquiring the open-source tools and data to boost its Battlefield and other systems. As such, it is committed to further developing the products, although it is unclear whether they will all remain open-source.
Patria classes several different products as situational awareness and cyber. The assets from WithSecure will be incorporated into its CRAWLR solution. It is a cyber intelligence solution that uses automated data gathering and classification along with machine learning.
CRAWLR’s primary target market is Government agencies, including intelligence, military, police, customers, and border guards.
Jussi Järvinen, Executive Vice President of Patria’s Finland Division, said, “Implementation of Patria’s growth strategy requires significant investment in product development, know-how and services.
“What Patria offers in its cyber business solutions and services is constantly being developed. Operational reliability and information security in all conditions are particularly essential when developing intelligence, monitoring and command systems to security-critical customers.”
Enterprise Times: What does this mean?
This is an interesting acquisition for Patria and a surprise sale by WithSecure, although there is some confusion over exactly what tools have been sold. WithSecure launched Detectree for blue teams back in 2022. However, when asked for clarification, WithSecure confirmed that Detectree is not included in this sale.
WithSecure has been asked for further clarification on what it means by products in the announcement. If it is only open-source data collection tools, then the products element is misleading. What is also unclear is what WithSecure will now do in terms of open-source intelligence gathering for its other tools. Will it licence tools back from Patria? Will it licence data from third parties?
On the Patria side, this acquisition strengthens its intelligence offerings at a critical time for the country. The country is suffering increased numbers of cyber-attacks and attempts to gather intelligence by Russian state-sponsored groups. This acquisition will allow Patria to increase its data-gathering capabilities and strengthen the products it sells.
