mmbg, wd - I have a different spin on Credant.
Credant historically did what Safend did, and indeed got their Protector product from Safend. Wave also licensed from Safend from which they back doored their way into some FIPS compliance.
Wave always poo-pooed old school stuff (Safend and Credant) but that stuff actually sold (Safend was almost 50% of Wave revs last Q, and the Q before that.
I agree that Wave treated the Dell deal like the finish line rather than the starting line, particularly as it followed later with GM.
Over time Credant moved towards Wave adding on some TC-like functionality, and while asleep at the wheel Wave finally, belatedly, too latedly, realized that some good old fashioned DLP would complement their offerings and help get them through some doors. It was too late for Dell. Had Wave bought SFND a few years earlier, Credant might have died at Dell (or at least if a competently managed Wave with steady quality updates and so on existed).
Dell cozying up to Credant precipitated the Safend purchase, requirements from BP sealed the deal.
The differences between Credant and Wave were always rather real, even in the Dell product line DDP-A and DDP-E. And some DDP-E was Safend.
That a $12m purchase brings in nearly half of Wave's revs against the half a billion invested in everything else speaks towards what was/is selling. Dell bought what sells. Wave thought forever that TC was any day and hence never wanted to get into the commdity market of DLP solutions. It was a mistake.
The above content is my opinion.
