- As part of their longstanding alliance, Cisco (NASDAQ:CSCO - unchanged) and Microsoft (MSFT +0.1%) have signed a new 3-year "go-to-market plan" featuring tech integration and sales/marketing partnerships for a slew of data center products.
- On Cisco's side, the products covered include its Nexus data center switches and UCS servers - two bright spots for the company. On Microsoft's site, they include Windows Server, SQL Server, System Center, and Azure.
- The deal, which comes amid Microsoft's partner conference (previous), also features a program to migrate Windows Server 2003 clients to UCS systems running Windows Server 2012 R2. Nonetheless, Microsoft and Cisco remain rivals in the unified communications software space.
- Separately, the WSJ reports Microsoft is close to buying Aorato, an Israeli developer of cybersecurity/identity-protection software, for $200M.
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Aorato's products analyze interactions with Microsoft's Active Directory (enterprise authentication/ID management) service to detect suspicious activity, and prevent unauthorized access to IT resources.
- The report follows the launch of an Azure identity/access management service in March, and comes amid a flurry of cybersecurity M&A activity.