26 January 2009

NETGEAR's STM Stream Scanning Technology brings Enterprise-Class Security within Reach of the SMB

SAN JOSE, Calif. - January 26, 2009 - NETGEAR®, Inc. (NASDAQGM: NTGR), a worldwide provider of technologically innovative, branded networking solutions, today announced that with the launch of its new line of Security Threat Management (STM) products, it is delivering levels of security and performance to the SMB that are normally only within reach of the enterprise. Aimed directly at businesses and delivered via NETGEAR's reseller partners, the STM Series of Web and Email Threat Management Appliances is NETGEAR's first family of products to be introduced under its ProSecure™ brand. The NETGEAR STM Series combines best-of-breed security features and patent-pending Stream Scanning technology, providing the SMB with an enterprise-class web and email protection solution against rapidly evolving Internet-based threats that is both simple and affordable. (See two other press releases issued today at www.netgear.com/About/PressReleases.aspx.)

The NETGEAR ProSecure STM Series offers three platforms, each with a different level of horsepower, to accommodate businesses with up to 600 concurrent users. The STM150, STM300 and STM600 all contain the same security functionality with increasing amounts of bandwidth to support various-sized SMBs.

"SMBs face the same exact web and email threats as enterprises, so they require the same level of protection. However, SMBs don't have the same in-house expertise and budgets as enterprises, so solutions aimed at them need to be simple to deploy and cost-effective as well," said Jason Leung, NETGEAR's senior product line manager for SMB Security. "Delivering a solution that meets these criteria is a challenging prospect. In order to meet profit margin requirements, other vendors targeting SMBs often use 'watered down' anti-spam engines that require laborious on-site tuning, antivirus engines that contain only limited signature databases, weak detection algorithms, have slow response times to new threats, and are not optimized for real-time web traffic. NETGEAR, with its ProSecure product line and innovative patent-pending Stream Scanning technology, has found a way to deliver SMBs cost-effective, enterprise-class security with significant ease-of-use."

Enterprise-class technologies differ from cheaper alternate solutions by protecting all of a particular threat type as opposed to covering only a small subset of it. However, these technologies are oftentimes processor-hungry and require expensive hardware to run effectively. NETGEAR's STM family of appliances is the first to solve this problem with its patent-pending web-optimized Stream Scanning architecture. As the foundation upon which the STM Series is built, NETGEAR's Stream Scanning Technology enables the use of enterprise-class detection techniques while maintaining high throughput. NETGEAR has also partnered with industry-leading Kaspersky Lab and Commtouch® to bring best-in-class web and email scanning technology engines to the STM platform. Running on top of the Stream Scanning platform, these engines work in parallel with the NETGEAR heuristics engine to protect against known and unknown threats.

"We've been using NETGEAR's STM Stream Scanning technology consistently and it has never failed to protect our network," said Russ Hedgpeth, CEO for Unity Electronics Inc., an electronics supply company based in Union City, California. "This technology has been critical in enabling me to manage and protect our business services without breaking my limited budget."

The ProSecure STM Series sets a new bar for SMB security management. The STM deploys in-line in a matter of minutes, anywhere behind the network firewall. It runs automatically and unobtrusively. There is no need to reconfigure mail servers or web proxies, unlike traditional proxy-based security solutions. Administration is performed through an intuitive web-based interface. SMBs can set granular policies and alerts, check summary statistics and graphical reports, drill down to IP address-level data, and integrate log data with standard network management tools such as SNMP.

"Historically, many security vendors have felt that SMBs didn't require enterprise-class security and thus simply created cheaper appliances with less functionality. It's clear now that this approach is not viable," stated Jeff Wilson, principal analyst for network security at Infonetics Research, a leading international market research and consulting firm serving the communications industry. "SMBs need just as much security and performance as an enterprise, but better management and easier deployment. NETGEAR's ProSecure STM series really tackles this problem head on."

NETGEAR Inc.

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