Red Hat agreed to acquire StackRox, a start-up specializing in container and Kubernetes-native security. Financial terms were not disclosed.
Unlike first-generation container security platforms, which were often container-centric offerings, StackRox differentiates with a Kubernetes-native security platform. The StackRox software provides visibility across all Kubernetes clusters, by directly deploying components for enforcement and deep data collection into the Kubernetes cluster infrastructure, reducing the time and effort needed to implement security, and streamlining security analysis, investigation and remediation. The StackRox policy engine includes hundreds of built-in controls to enforce security best practices, industry standards such as CIS Benchmarks and NIST, and configuration management of both containers and Kubernetes, and runtime security.
StackRox’s Kubernetes-native security capabilities will be integrated into the Red Hat OpenShift enterprise Kubernetes platform. In addition to Red Hat OpenShift, StackRox will continue to support multiple Kubernetes platforms, including Amazon Elastic Kubernetes Service (EKS), Microsoft Azure Kubernetes Service (AKS), and Google Kubernetes Engine (GKE).
“Securing Kubernetes workloads and infrastructure cannot be done in a piecemeal manner; security must be an integrated part of every deployment, not an afterthought. Red Hat adds StackRox’s Kubernetes-native capabilities to OpenShift’s layered security approach, furthering our mission to bring product-ready open innovation to every organization across the open hybrid cloud across IT footprints,” stated Paul Cormier, president and CEO, Red Hat.
“We’re thrilled to join forces with Red Hat, coupling the industry’s first Kubernetes-native security platform with the leading Kubernetes platform for hybrid cloud, multicloud, and edge deployments. This is a tremendous validation of our innovative approach to container and Kubernetes security. Red Hat is an ideal partner to accelerate our vision of enabling organizations to securely build, deploy and run their cloud-native applications anywhere,” said Kamal Shah, CEO, StackRox.
- StackRox, which is based in Mountain View, California, was founded in 2014 by Ali Golshan and Wei Lien Dang. Golshan previous was the founder & CTO of Cyphort, which was acquired by Juniper Networks. Dang previously held senior product management roles for security and cloud infrastructure at Amazon Web Services, Splunk, and Bracket Computing. StackRox is headed by Kamal Shah (CEO), who previously was SVP of products and marketing at Skyhigh Networks, a leading Cloud Access Security Broker (CASB) acquired by McAfee in January 2018.