04 January 2006 Security giant Symantec has continued its recent acquisition spree having agreed to acquire instant messaging (IM) security vendor IMlogic for an undisclosed, all-cash sum.

During the past two years Symantec has sparked a bout of consolidation within the software security market with a number of high-profile acquisitions.

The agreement to acquire IMlogic, which is expected to close in early February 2006, extends Symantec’s presence into the burgeoning secure instant messaging market.

According to IT analysis house Gartner, global corporate spending on instant messaging licences is set to grow from $286.9 million in 2005 to $639.6 million by 2009. That growth is being driven by enterprises’ willingness to invest in more effective ways to communicate.

But the increased adoption of instant messaging is being accompanied by growing numbers of malicious attacks that use the systems. IMlogic recently reported that the number of IM-based attacks was 826% higher in December 2005 than the same period a year earlier.

“Our customers have asked us for a holistic management tool to control all real-time collaboration and keep it highly available, compliant, and secure,” said Francis deSouza, IMlogic’s president and CEO.

Since its 2004 acquisition of anti-spam vendor Brightmail, Symantec has brokered a number of high-profile deals, including: the acquisition of storage software vendor Veritas; security consultants @stake; and network security company BindView.

Symantec and IMlogic had previously co-operated on security research.