The Russians are coming, the Russians are coming!

By Ellen Messmer, NetworkWorld.com, 02/07/05

In the 1966 movie "The Russians are coming, the Russians are coming!" made during the Cold War Era, a Soviet sub with no hostile intent runs aground off the shores of New England, sending local villagers into a tizzy. This movie came to mind as I heard that Moscow-based anti-virus firm Kaspersky Labs will be opening its first U.S. office in Woburn, Mass. this month.

With nary a direct business customer in the U.S., Kaspersky Labs intends to go head to head against a crowded field of antivirus vendors, including Symantec, McAfee, and Trend Micro, to name only the largest.

Eugene Kaspersky, with former spouse Natalya (they are said to run the company amicably in spite of the marriage ending) founded Kaspersky Labs back in '97. The privately held firm, while not publishing its revenues, is tipping its hand to say it did have $27 million in sales last year. Some American businesses may be using Kaspersky Labs anti-virus protection in security appliances under OEM agreements with vendors such as Nokia. However, Kaspersky Labs, which has about 380 employees worldwide, including 15 in the U.S., only now is starting to directly sell and support its anti-virus software to enterprise customers here.

Eugene Kaspersky says his firm intends to attract U.S.-based business customers through close attention to service.

"We have support like an ambulance," he says, promising to beat the big anti-virus players in terms of responding to suspected new viruses submitted as samples to Kaspersky's lab in order to turn around a signature defense pronto.

Kaspersky Labs says it counts several European business and governmental organizations, including the German parliament Deutsche Bundestag, and the French Ministry of Foreign Trade and France Telecom, as customers.

Steve Orenberg, the newly named president of Kaspersky Labs, will head up the American operations. Once president of anti-virus firm Sophos, Orenberg admits that his experience tells him that breaking into the U.S. corporate anti-virus market may not be easy.

"There is a 95% saturation rate," Orenberg acknowledges. But he adds there's also enough "churn" -- companies switching vendors for a variety of reasons, including discontent with service or price -- to give Kaspersky Labs a chance.
Like the movie "The Russians are Coming," it may take the locals a while to warm up to the unexpected arrivals on the shores of New England. But who else but Russians from Moscow would decide to move to Massachusetts in the middle of winter?

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