Cisco borgs network 'guardian angel'

Networking giant Cisco Systems is acquiring privately held Pari Networks for an undisclosed sum.

Pari, according to company co-founder and CEO Kishore Kumar, means "guardian angel" in Sanskrit, and the Paritra Security Appliance that the company created is supposed to be an angel watching over your network devices, doing vulnerability analysis and security assessments for all of the gadgets out there on the network while enforcing consistent security policies for all of those devices to keep the auditors happy.

Kishore spent ten years at Cisco, managing router security, before starting Pari Networks in April 2005. The company's other co-founders - Satyan Raju, chief technical officer; Sreenivas Devalla, chief development officer; and Siri Kothe, chief operating officer - all hail from Cisco, as does Venkat Sanapala, director of technical operations for Pari's Hyderabad, India development offices.

All of Pari Networks' employees are coming over as part of the acquisition, and the company's products and services will be tucked up inside Cisco's Technical Services organization. The idea is to do a better job of proactive maintenance and monitoring of network gear. Cisco expects the deal to close before the end of fiscal 2011's third quarter, which ends in April. ®