Leonardo will strengthen its cyber products portfolio with an increasingly international view, acquiring a 24.55% stake in SSH Communications Security Corporation (“SSH”), a Finnish cyber-security company. The Q&A-type event aims to generate a total value of EUR 20 million, consistent with Leonardo’s industrial plan and consolidates the company’s European leadership in Trusted Cyber Security, or the cybersecurity model in which trust should never be implied, but always reviewed. The initiative, which also makes Leonardo the only industrial investor in the Finnish company, represents a significant step towards the development of a Zero Trust ecosystem “Made in Europe”.
“_Cyber-security_,” says **Roberto Cingolani, CEO and General Manager of Leonardo**_,”is one of the strategic areas of development of our industrial plan. With this acquisition, Leonardo expands its portfolio globally, positioning itself as a reference point to guide the Zero Trust revolution in Europe. The agreement incorporates SSH’s technological expertise with Leonardo’s technologies and solutions, advanced assets and services, and specific domain knowledge. As threats evolve rapidly and regulations tighten, organizations increasingly need advanced future-proof solutions_.”
SSH is named after its Secure Shell protocol, a reference standard for online communication. The company has technology for the security of hybrid cloud environments and IT and OT infrastructures with solutions featuring proprietary quantum-safe encryption: it is a European leader in Privileged Access Management (PAM) for secure and dynamic access to critical systems, cloud environments and sensitive devices. It also owns proprietary encryption solutions for Wide Area Network (WAN) certified for government and military environments, designed to protect data traffic between remote sites, data centers and critical environments for secure communication between systems, robust authentication, advanced encryption, and centralized key management abilities.
For more than 30 years, SSH has been protecting critical systems of governments, institutions, leading companies, global financial organizations, and critical infrastructures worldwide, through a network of partners in North America, Europe, and Asia.
Besides the investment, Leonardo and SSH will launch a partnership governed by a cooperation agreement that entails exclusivity for Leonardo to integrate SSH solutions within Leonardo’s broader Zero Trust offer, except in Nordic countries.
The common goal is to build a secure digital future where the “never trust, always verify” principle is concretely achievable with a “Made in Europe” ecosystem.
Leonardo’s subscription of SSH’s 13,333,333 new shares and the cooperation agreement between Leonardo and SSH are subject to (i) approval by SSH’s extraordinary shareholders’ meeting, among other things, of the issue of shares by the SSH board of directors, (ii) confirmation pursuant to Finnish regulations on foreign direct investments by foreign entities in Finnish companies operating in the defence sector (FDI), (iii) as well as other conditions typical in investment transactions of this nature.
Leonardo was assisted by Deloitte as financial advisor and by DLA Piper as legal advisor.
Source: Leonardo Press Office
