Intel Selling Majority Stake In Intel Security, 'New' Company To Be Called McAfee (fortune.com) 30
An anonymous reader quotes a report from Fortune: Intel is spinning out its security business with help from private equity firm TPG, as the chip giant focuses more on its top growth opportunities. Intel will collect $3.1 billion in cash and retain a 49% ownership stake. TPG will own 51% of the new company, to be called McAfee. Under terms of the spin off, TPG will make a $1.1 billion equity investment in McAfee, which will also take on $2 billion of debt. The deal is expected to close in the second quarter of 2017, Intel said. The deal ends Intel's sometimes tumultuous efforts to add cybersecurity software features to its various semiconductor chip businesses. It also marks a near-final coda to Intel's $8 billion purchase of McAfee in 2010. Analysts and investors have favored disposing of the business, which they said didn't add much to the chip sales and was too dependent on the shrinking PC market. The unit reported $1.1 billion of revenue in the first half of the year, up 11% from the same period of 2015, and operating income of $182 million, a 391% jump. Chris Young, who joined Intel's security unit from Cisco Systems in 2014, will be CEO of the new company. Intel said it still plans to collaborate with McAfee to add security features across its product lines.
Re: (Score:3)
Re: (Score:2)
Yeah. This is like that time I hired a Bangkok prostitute to disinfect my computer while I....
Re: (Score:2)
un-uninstallable malware
There is actually a good tutorial [youtube.com] on how to uninstall MaAfee AV software.
Re: (Score:1)
Re: (Score:1)
Also, performance-wise McAfee antivirus has earned a reputation for slowing down systems a lot. I remember a previous job, where running McAfee antivirus was mandated by management. Some tasks were impossible to achieve in reasonably time, such as major searches in the file system, unless you temporarily deactivated the antivirus software.
I don't think it is a good idea for TPG to move to the name McAfee for its products. Or for Intel to hold significant shares in such a venture.
Re: (Score:2)
I think you meant "un-uninstallable malware".
Also, Mr. McAfee will continue to make the name less valuable with time. But the days of SCAN and CLEAN...those were wonderful days.
So it's not just me. We suffered through a POC project that was an absolute embarrassment for Intel/McAffee and it took days to burn out the remnants of the installation on the various systems that couldn't simply be re-imaged.
Re: (Score:3)
Because they want to give a big fuck you to Johnny boy. There's a reason this is only happening after he attempted to make a company using his name. At a guess they were already planning to spin it off and decided to take a great big shit on his plans at the same time.
Re: (Score:2)
If they did, it was McAfee making them jump to his command.
He will run with it. What will he do next? Think of him as a rich /btard. One of the ones with good senses of humor.
Would it be insider trading for McAfee to buy out the money puts on his namesake, based on knowledge of insane things he intended to do very publicly? Could he charge large institutional investors (hedge funds) for that knowledge?
I may have invented a new crime. Granting one I can't personally profit from.
Re: (Score:2)
There's a reason this is only happening after he attempted to make a company using his name.
Wow. What nerve. Good thing Intel has an army of lawyers to protect themselves against him.
Re: (Score:1)
Well, they're not going to call it "shit puke malware" are they?
And there's just not that certain marketing-acceptable ring to "vomit excrement fuckupyourcomputerware" is there?
Short Sighted (Score:3)
Thinking the security future is PC-based is short-sighted at best. Security in the future is going to be about hand-held devices, moving data (between devices, cloud, etc.), and the small, connected devices we like to call the Internet-of-Things.
These markets will make the PC security market looks small.
Re: (Score:2)
and that is different from today how exactly? unless i am mistaken intel is not focused on PC only silicon either.
Re: (Score:3)
From the article:
"Analysts and investors have favored disposing of the business, which they said didn't add much to the chip sales and was too dependent on the shrinking PC market."
In shared computing environments (the cloud) and in small-form-factor networked computing (IoT), creating new security mechanisms which may require hardware/software co-design is the future. The statement above pretty much ignores this, hence my comment.
The sort of thing I am referring to is already present in hard
Pretty sure this is just a thumb in the eye... (Score:3)
Pretty sure this is just a thumb in the eye for John McAfee suing Intel to get commercial use of his name back.
Re: (Score:2)
It'll never happen. People lose control of their names all the time, especially in the fashion industry. Look at Kate Spade. She made a big brand under her name, but then sold out to a giant megacorp. That megacorp owns her name now, and she has to start hew new fashion line under the name Frances Valentine.
John thinks he'll win the lawsuit because, like so many other people in Silicon Valley, he's arrogant and thinks the rules of every other industry don't apply to tech.
"Security business" is a misnomer (Score:2)
... or, at least it's only part of what the new McAfee will be offering.
They're also planning to launch a new line of hallucinogenic rectal bath salts.
Back to being McAfee (Score:2)
I'm kind of bummed about this, I had a small hope that Intel could turn this product around but spinning it back out will kind of kills that dream. It's not that I have any love for it, but I have customers that use it so I'm stuck dealing with it in my job.
Re: (Score:2)
John will just have more fun at their expense.
As I speculate upthread, it might be illegal for McAfee to buy out of the money puts based on knowledge of his future behavior. But considering the global nature of stocks and McAfee's being unencumbered by excessive (any) respect for laws, I think he can likely get the bets down pseudo anonymously in one stock exchange or another.
The key question is: How many points will McAfee Security stock be moved by a trip to Carnival in Rio if John really gets a wild
Race to the bottom (Score:2)
He did, for lots of money, and now sells anti-spyw (Score:2)
He got paid quite well for the McAfee name, and now he wants to sell anti-spyware software under that name.
Uhm... no, it doesn't work that way (Score:4, Insightful)
Hello,
Intel had been investigating selling Intel Security (nee McAfee) for well over a year, so this is hardly a recent development on their part. And regardless of what the Slashdot crowd things of the products' quality, they do have massive amounts of brand recognition in both the consumer and enterprise spaces.
Mr. McAfee had given up the rights to his name when preparing McAfee Associates' IPO and did quite well in terms of how he was compensated. Even back in 1995 he was already trying to get his name back from Bill Larson (then President, CEO and Chairman of McAfee Associates) and having no luck. As much as Bill hated the McAfee name, he realized there was so much money to be made in it, and took the company from $20-30M in revenue to billions of dollars in valuation .
Mr. McAfee's one of the smartest business people I know, and his ability to rapidly absorb data, synthesize it and come up with all sorts of ideas for products is pretty darn amazing, and frankly, with all of the time and effort he's put into being in front of the media, trying to get his name back at this point is a waste of time and shareholder's money spent on lawyers: Due to his recent high-profile activities, there's enough interest in Mr. McAfee that he doesn't need to capitalize on his name, anymore. He could name a company "Spicy Lemon" and still generate media attention because of his involvement with it, just as he's done with all the products he's taken on since returning to the U.S. after fleeing Belize.
Regards,
Aryeh Goretsky
Mcripoff has been over priced and sold to fail ove (Score:1)