“India is the driving gear for Aladdin”

Erez Rozen, chief financial officer of hardware-based security systems provider Aladdin Knowledge Systems, spoke to Rahul Neel Mani when he was in India recently and explained how hardware-based software protection system actually works

What is Aladdin Knowledge Systems all about?
Aladdin started in 1985 as a software protection company. The company grew by original sales through distributors, and mergers and acquisitions. Aladdin enjoys a wide international presence, with almost every country using Aladdin products to protect software. We have subsidiaries in Japan, the Netherlands, the UK, Germany and the US. The company also has research and development facilities in Israel, Germany and the US.

Though software protection was our core business when the company commenced operations, today Aladdin is not just a software protection company. Our second core business stream is enterprise security. The company has around 360 employees worldwide, of which 190 are into research and development. The $50 million company has already got over 40 patents in its name so far in the software security arena.

What is software protection and why is it needed?
A software protection strategy is important for any company. People work to create immense amount of IP (intellectual property) in terms of software programs, which they want to protect from any kind of hazard.

Unfortunately stealing software is not considered as grave an act as stealing physical goods such as cars or currency. Aladdin’s customers are mainly developers of software and IP. We have 25,000 customers worldwide using Aladdin software protection products. Instead of password protection or encryption techniques we provide a hardware key, which is plugged in the back of the CPU of the desktop to protect software. This hardware is a licensed hardware. These dongles contain very advanced technology inside. Once you start the program, the software has to essentially look for this hardware. It has a very user-friendly, simple-to-install program. Aladdin’s customers range from companies that sell software licenses ranging between $500 up to $1,00, 000.

What are your offerings in the enterprise security space?
Several years ago, Aladdin decided to grow into the area of Internet security. The company acquired a player in the content security arena—we now provide anti-spamming, anti-virus, content security solutions, etc. In parallel, Aladdin also developed an authentication key (USB key) which goes into the USB drive and works as an authentication device. It works on the principle of two-factor authentication. ESafe is another product in the enterprise range of security offerings from Aladdin. These smart hardware devices enable technologies such as PKI to work. Our devices are complementary to techniques such as PKI.

What kind of market do you see for yourself in India?
India is one market with immense potential and large growth prospects for Aladdin. As per projections, India will `soon be the number one software developing country in the world. We have been in India for the past seven years and we feel that we have a great future in this market. I see India as a driving gear for Aladdin. Any software, which has a potential hazard of getting hacked or even pirated, is fit to use our products.

What are the future plans for India? Do you plan to form an Indian subsidiary here?
The company is actively engaged in releasing new and upgraded versions of the products. We are committed to release new products and upgrades of the existing products. We have top class German engineers working in the Munich R&D facility located in Germany.

As of now it would be early to comment whether we would like to create an Indian subsidiary of the company but it is not ruled out in future.