In 2009, it acquired Defensio, a spam and malware company focused on social media. In October 2007, it acquired email security vendor SurfControl for $400 million. In 2006, Websense acquired a fingerprint security company, PortAuthority. In 2006, former McAfee CEO Gene Hodges succeeded Carrington as chief executive officer of the company. The stock price doubled on its first day of trading. In March 2000, at the peak of the dot-com bubble, it raised $72 million in an initial public offering. In June 1999, NetPartners was renamed Websense. Later that year, investors pushed Trubey out of the CEO position and appointed John Carrington as his replacement. In 1998, NetPartners raised $6 million in venture capital funding and had $6 million in annual revenue. The company began as a reseller of network security products, and then developed software for controlling Internet use by employees.

The company was founded in 1994 as NetPartners in Sorrento Valley, San Diego by Phil Trubey. Francisco Partners acquired the company from Raytheon in January 2021.Ĭorporate history NetPartners

In 2015, Websense acquired network security vendor Stonesoft from Intel and in 2016, the company was renamed Forcepoint. Raytheon acquired an 80% interest in Websense in April 2015 for $1.9 billion and acquired the remaining 20% interest in 2019. Vista Equity Partners acquired Websense in 2013 for $906 million. It was renamed Websense in 1999 and became a public company in 2000 at the peak of the dot-com bubble. Forcepoint, is an American multinational corporation software company headquartered in Austin, Texas, that develops computer security software and data protection, cloud access security broker, firewall and cross-domain solutions.įorcepoint was founded in 1994 as an information technology reseller called NetPartners.

Forcepoint firewall