Israeli Software Firm Drops U.S. Deal

[cal04]

A leading Israeli software company abandoned its plans Thursday to buy a smaller U.S. rival in a $225 million deal because of national security objections by the Bush administration. Check Point Software Technologies Ltd. in Ramat Gan, Israel, formally withdrew its proposal near the conclusion of a rare, full-blown investigation by a U.S. review panel over the company's plans to buy a smaller rival, Sourcefire Inc.

Check Point had been told U.S. officials feared the transaction could endanger some of government's most sensitive computer systems. Lawyers for Check Point offered to attach conditions to the sale that executives believed were onerous but were intended to satisfy the concerns expressed by the review panel, the Committee on Foreign Investments in the United States, said one person familiar with the process. But no agreement could be reached.

The Treasury Department, which oversees the committee, formally accepted Check Point's request to withdraw from the review process. This ensures the panel will not be required to submit recommendations to President Bush whether to block the deal. The committee has concluded only 25 full-blown investigations in more than 1,600 business transactions it has reviewed since 1988. In roughly half the investigations, companies pulled out of the deal rather than face imminent rejection.

George H.W. Bush is the only president ever to block a deal, stopping the sale of a Seattle aircraft parts manufacturer to China in February 1990. The objections by the FBI and Pentagon were partly over specialized intrusion detection software known as "Snort," which guards some classified U.S. military and intelligence computers. Snort's author is a senior executive at Sourcefire, based in Columbia, Md. The investigation was carried out by the same U.S. review panel that approved the now-abandoned ports deal involving Dubai-owned DP World.

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20060324/ap_on_go_ot/software_sale

[Charlie Brown]

1. and yet we're supposed to sell our ports to the UAE

Why not go by the Administration's playbook and say the White House is anti-Semitic for blocking this deal.

[DBoon]

2. I always knew this deal wasn't kosher

An Israeli company buying a US company with a pig for a logo just wouldn't happen

http://www.snort.org/

[OneBlueSky]

3. isn't Check Point the outfit that compiled the lists . . .

of ineligible voters for the Florida elections? . . . if so, I had no idea they weren't an American firm . . .

[cantstandbush]

4. This is only one deal. Checkpoint is deep into US info tech.

You will have to do some thorough research to find out about how much of US info security is really in the hands of Israel and some via India.

[Coastie for Truth]

6. And the PRC

Did you know that DOD and the State Department will be (are) buying Lenovo PC's (Lenovo bought IBM's PC business) -- with Microsoft Beijing Windows, Office, and Outlook? Talk about a security hole.

[anotherdrew]

5. this seems very odd. Sourcefire doesn't seem government connected

why would they object? they make a packet sniffing package, maybe they've done other work for the NSA spying systems?