Intel Buys McAfee for $7,680,000,000

[LORD_ORION]

I do not understand why anyone would want to move into this consumer space now that MSE is out, and free.

It's like buying netscape for a premium just as MS is burying them with free IE.

 

[partytime]

[citation][nom]ecnovaec[/nom]I repair computers for a living... and unless Intel knows something about mcafee that i don't, this is a HUGE mistake. I have NEVER seen a pc with mcafee that wasn't loaded with viruses. ever.[/citation]

That depends on what McAfee you are talking about. The consumer version? would not come within 100TB of it.. the Corporate version is a WHOLE nother software and has pretty much never let me down. I've seen other offices with norton and kapersky get viruses where the corporate version of McAfee held strong.

 

[Ragnar-Kon]

[citation][nom]kydan[/nom]They need to buy AMD imo[/citation]
*facepalm*

 

[LORD_ORION]

[citation][nom]zipzoomflyhigh[/nom]Buying Nvidia would have made more sense.[/citation]

You wouldn't say that if you know what they did with Dialogic & their HMP software.

Their shares actually went up when they sold it for a multi-billion $ loss (compared to what thy paid for it), that is how badly entering the telephony market space ate into their revenue.

 

[shloader]

[citation][nom]dfusco[/nom]McAfee Products A to Z[/citation]

So... basically what I thought, then. Their home user anti-virus is an afterthought and performs as such. Didn't know they make all this slosh and I'm sure a lot of it isn't that well maintained. But if they make all that isn't there someone reading all this who works in the IT world with something, anything positive to say about McAfee? ... anyone?

 

[Trueno07]

[citation][nom]partytime[/nom]That depends on what McAfee you are talking about. The consumer version? would not come within 100TB of it.. the Corporate version is a WHOLE nother software and has pretty much never let me down. I've seen other offices with norton and kapersky get viruses where the corporate version of McAfee held strong.[/citation]

Why don't the consumers have the corporate version? Because consumer McAffee is awful.

 

[festerovic]

To those that say this is an odd fit: Intel must be working on on-chip security. What better way to jump in than to buy the industry leader in computer security?

I have used McAfee before, it is a lame product that barely does what it says. But the just because their execution of products sucks(at the retail home user market) doesn't mean the corp sucks. I am looking forward to seeing what kind of active antivirus monitoring this eventually results in. "Doctor" co-processors that do scans...

 

[jimishtar]

imagine: "...today Intel announced that their next generation of chipset and cpu line will support only McAffee antivirus software..." that would be funny ))

 

[ssddx]

[citation][nom]one-shot[/nom]...economics...[/citation]

First if it was a complete monopoly the company would be dismantled according to anti-monopoly laws.

Second, if they controlled the entire market that is exactly what they could do. Some people and corporations absolutely need the products so would be forced to pay any cost.

In the scheme of things even if they marked products up 50% the cost in hardware would still be much less than any software. It is not uncommon to have a pc running at least $25,000-50,000 in software in the professional world. Instead of simply saying "no-one will buy" you should be saying "i wouldnt buy"

-no offense-

 

[ssddx]

festerovic,

Good point. I wonder what an on-chip AV might offer. I agree that the consumer AV is pretty much useless though

Could something that is hardware level prevent/fix ring0 malware?

 

[exodite]

[citation][nom]festerovic[/nom]To those that say this is an odd fit: Intel must be working on on-chip security.[/citation]
That's my thinking as well, this must be a sneaky way to try and push what eventually became the TPM onto consumers again.

 

[hang-the-9]

I had no idea McAfee was valued so highly. Whoever bought this at MS obviously has not read a single review of the software because I have yet to see a good one for their products.

Maybe they bought it to take if off the market so Windows PCs can get a better reputation for being virus-free.

 

[zorky9]

[citation][nom]partytime[/nom]That depends on what McAfee you are talking about. The consumer version? would not come within 100TB of it.. the Corporate version is a WHOLE nother software and has pretty much never let me down. I've seen other offices with norton and kapersky get viruses where the corporate version of McAfee held strong.[/citation]
Last April McAfee released a flawed update to their library which affected hundreds of corporate subscribers globally resulting to thousands of man-hours lost. Fail.

 

[bison88]

For those of you that don't know, McAfee is huge in the corporate world, up there with Norton. Their consumer market is just sort of "meh, we bundle it with new computers."

I'm surprised Intel though buying McAfee for $7.8 billion was a worthy investment. Maybe they have something in mind to reap back that loss. Or maybe they are just showing the world their big endless wallet.

 

[zoemayne]

with a deal like this how many people are set for life? I've read that this deal was all cash.

 

[Travis Beane]

I;m sticking with MSE.
Loving it so far. Saved my credit card number a couple times (maybe should stop using sketchy software...).

 

[Guest]

rofl, someone just brought me their infected laptop. First thing I notice, aside from the virus popups, was a nice McAfee logo in the bottom right corner. First thing I did? Uninstall McAfee, install Kaspersky. Viruses removed, laptop back to normal. I actually rank Norton higher than McAfree for the first time ever, simply because they have been trying to improve their antivir products lately..

 

[Guest]

Intel probably bought McAfee to help them build on their garbage GPUs

 

[jojesa]

McAfee has a great business portfolio, that's what Intel is going after, but the home (antivirus) products is just junk. The McAfee home division products appear to come from a different company when you compare them to the products from their business division.
Most of us are only familiar with their crappy home products, but if you work in the ITS industry you would have an idea about their other solutions.

Intel has acquired several software and hardware vendors in the past couple of years and they might want to integrate security into their hardware .

 

[jacobdrj]

Eddie Valiant: Nobody's gonna drive this lousy freeway when they can take the Red Car for a nickel.
Judge Doom: Oh, they'll drive. They'll have to. You see, I bought the Red Car so I could dismantle it.

 

[Guest]

erm, McAfee is kinda rubbish in the corporate environment, the reason corporates are relatively safe is because they have corporate level firewalls at the gateway with actively maintained database to minimize the outbreaks of viruses on the network, they reason then that they just need puny desktop virus scanners, at which point the cheapest one on offer is good enough...... it's also the reason why when a corporate network has been compromised they fall like dominoes, ive seen a whole domain fall to a worm within the matter of an afternoon, any guess what the virus scanner was

 

[mlopinto2k1]

SEVEN. BILLION. DOLLARS!? Jesus H Christ!

 

[ta152h]

[citation][nom]ares1214[/nom]No offense, but that is the dumbest thing ive heard in quite some time. AMD is their competition, if they buy them up, theres no more competition, and intel is the only cpu manufacturer, AKA, MONOPOLY. Then the can charge whatever they want for anything.[/citation]

Well, what you wrote was pretty stupid too, but you'll have to try harder to reach his level.

AMD going away wouldn't change prices as much as people think. The problem Intel would have is keeping their fabs running, and if they overcharged, people wouldn't buy PCs as often. Microsoft is a monopoly, but even they can't charge what they want, because if they do, they'll sell fewer copies. For Intel, it would be far worse to overcharge, because then their fabs would not be running full out, and that's a waste of money.

If overcharging made people hold onto a PC for a year or two longer than they otherwise would, it would hurt Intel dramatically. Let's be honest, PCs from 2003 work fine for what most people need to do (I am typing this on a Tualatin Pentium III-S at 1.575 GHz, and it is still a very usable computer), so that's also a consideration for prices now, and even without AMD.

Also, don't forget Centaur (part of VIA). They make very interesting processors, and they'd also be around if AMD folded. IBM might decide to enter the x86 race too, if they still have the license. Intel would be scared to death of IBM, which has technology and talent far exceeding AMD.

Still, I think AMD folding would be a bad thing, of course, especially if they brought ATI down with them.

 

[jacobdrj]

[citation][nom]festerovic[/nom]To those that say this is an odd fit: Intel must be working on on-chip security. What better way to jump in than to buy the industry leader in computer security? I have used McAfee before, it is a lame product that barely does what it says. But the just because their execution of products sucks(at the retail home user market) doesn't mean the corp sucks. I am looking forward to seeing what kind of active antivirus monitoring this eventually results in. "Doctor" co-processors that do scans...[/citation]
I agree with the principle idea of integrating security with software and hardware from the guys who know how to execute x86 code the best, the IP property holder... However, Intel has lots of cash. LOTS AND LOTS OF CASH... Why wouldn't they ante up and purchase a superior company, rather then the bottom-of-the-barrel company that has never shown they actually have the ability or talent to do their core job, namely malware protection? They could have bought AVG, or AVAST, or even Zone Alarm, which would also go with their network market of the top of the line server/workstation/consumer network cards for the firewall IP with AV IP? All of the companies I mentioned have a better track record of executing both internet security via firewalls and anti-malware software than McAffee...

 

[Major7up]

Ok how has anyone not mentioned the fact that they bought a majority stake (65%) of Grisoft, the makers of AVG among other things. I see the last poster mentioned that they could have bought AVG but they already have! Why do they now need McCrapee?