"It's such a hot market that there's a real scramble going on for market share," Jan Sundgren, analyst for Forrester Research, said.
Hackers, viruses, spam and other threats have made security the No. 1 priority in many corporations. Worldwide spending on security, as well as technology to keep a company operating after a major disaster, such as the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attack, is expected to grow twice as fast as spending on other information technology over the next several years. As a result, the market is expected to reach more than $116 billion by 2007, according to International Data Corp.
For security companies, the time to grab market share is now, while many companies are still choosing key security vendors.
"At some point you'll get market saturation," Sundgren said. "Most companies will have bought something, and you'll start to see consolidation among vendors."
Network Associates is expected to focus on an emerging product category called security management, which is also the focus of rivals Symantec and Computer Associates, Peter Firstbrook, analyst for market researcher Meta Group said.
