CA buys NetQoS for $200M

CA said Monday it has reached a US$200 million deal to buy NetQoS, a maker of software for tracking network and application performance. The transaction is scheduled to close before the end of the year.

The Austin, Texas, company's technology provides "good low-level network monitoring and a nice ability to ... hunt down how poor network performance is effecting the rest of the stack," said Redmonk analyst Michael Coté. NetQoS also recently added capabilities for application monitoring in virtualized environments.

NetQoS will also provide "a refresh" to CA's Spectrum network management software, said Forrester Research analyst Jean-Pierre Garbani. But it remains to be seen exactly how CA will blend NetQoS' products with its own portfolio, which also includes the Wily application performance monitoring product.

NetQoS has more than 1,000 customers and generated $56 million in sales last year. CEO Joel Trammell and CTO Cathy Fulton will take new jobs at CA, and "a majority" of other NetQoS employees will be retained, according to a statement.

The NetQoS deal follows CA's recent acquisition of technology from Cassatt for optimizing data center operations. Combined, the software will give CA the ability to manage network and application performance across physical, virtual and cloud environments, the company said in a statement.