Palo Alto Networks's $1 billion shopping spreeNrkbetaPalo Alto Networks acquired Twistlock, a YL portfolio company, for $410 million at the end of May, putting an end to a trajectory that Leitersdorf thought might end with an IPO in the next two years.
Palo Alto Networks is one of the most active buyers in cybersecurity. In the year since Arora joined Palo Alto Networks as CEO, the company has spent more than $1.1 billion on acquisitions. In March, it bought security startup Demisto for $560 million, and in October 2018 it spent $173 million on RedLock.
Though Cisco spent a record $3.7 billion on its dramatic eve of IPO acquisition of the performance management company AppDynamics in 2017, bankers in the space told Business Insider that they couldn't see Cisco paying more than that on another acquisition. CrowdStrike's valuation far exceeded what even Cisco, with its $236 billion market cap, is willing to pay, they said.
If Cisco wanted a company that does what CrowdStrike does, he said, they would probably go for a lower-cost competitor such as SentinelOne, which hit a $600 million valuation in a June funding round, or its even smaller competitor enSilo.