F5 Networks’ acquisition of Shape for over $1bn in cash more than doubles its addressable market in security.
Fraud and abuse prevention specialist Shape adds protection from automated attacks, botnets and targeted fraud to F5’s portfolio of application services.
Its customers include banks, airlines, retailers and government agencies.
In particular, Shape defends against credential stuffing attacks, where cybercriminals use stolen passwords from third party data breaches to take over other online accounts.
“We know from the companies we work with that applications are critical to running their business," said F5 President and CEO, François Locoh-Donou.
"To drive maximum business value and the best experiences for their customers, these apps need to perform flawlessly while protecting data security and user privacy.
"When a website or application experience is degraded by web fraud and abuse, the result is lost revenue, lost brand equity and customers jumping ship to the competition.
“Beyond opening a fast growing $4bn adjacent market, Shape’s machine learning and AI-powered capabilities will scale and extend F5’s portfolio of application services and expand our ability to optimise and protect customers’ applications in an increasingly complex multi-cloud world.”