What Does Thales’ Acquisition of Imperva Mean for Its Government ID Business?

Thales has continued to expand through its ninth acquisition in the digital security area, acquiring Imperva, a leader in providing data and application security software. The acquisition was settled ahead of the initial planned timeline on December 4, 2023 for US$3.6 billion, and integration will begin from January 2024, enabling Thales to improve its sensitive data protection and access management. This marks a significant advancement for Thales’ market position, extending global cybersecurity capabilities for enterprises and governments.

Thales’ acquisition is in line with targets communicated earlier in the year to increase shareholder value considerably. This will come through the growing profile of Thales’ Digital Identity and Security business segment, and through creating business opportunity, including offering Imperva's suite of solutions to existing customers, which will result in significant increases in revenue in years to come. In the realm of Thales’ ID business, three technology specialties of Imperva complement Thales’ existing solutions, and will broaden the range of potential implementations, incorporating best-in-class security assurance through Imperva’s range of products, which includes the following:

• Application Security: Unified protection for each application and Application Programming Interface (API) in the cloud, on-premises, or in a hybrid model. The product suite includes a Web Application Firewall (WAF), Distributed Denial of Service attack (DDoS) protection, advanced bot protection, API security, a developer-friendly Content Delivery Network (CDN), and Runtime Application Self-Protection (RASP).
• Data Security: Protection and access control of sensitive data. The product suite includes the CipherTrust Data Security Platform, Imperva Data Security Fabric, and the Luna and payShield Hardware Security Modules (HSMs), often used as the root of trust for cryptographic operations.
• Identity and Access Management (IAM): Simplified, secure, and trusted access to applications and digital services for customers, employees, and partners. The product suite includes the OneWelcome Identity Platform and SafeNet Trusted Access.

As the identity market looks to move toward holistic turnkey solutions that span the physical and digital domain, Thales’ unique position enables addressing customer requirements in the widest sense. Expanded data security capability aids with creating and updating secure citizen registries for both physical and digital credentials, with reduced threats, and applying security expertise within Imperva will better enable Thales to seize the growing market for mobile identity apps. This omits the reliance on external partnerships, allowing more coordinated and streamlined implementations that can cater to the broadest and most specific identity system demands.

As the accessible market increases, customers will have even further incentive to select Thales as an implementer, given Imperva’s historically established position as a trusted vendor. Due to Thales’ financial power, competitors largely do not have the financial power to complete similar transactions and expand through acquisitions at this scale, so most will hone in on opportunities that fall within their existing product portfolios. Alternatively, the development of in-house solutions to match the Imperva portfolio remains possible, but again, this is a resource-heavy investment.