TEL AVIV, ISRAEL and PHILADELPHIA, PA and LUXEMBOURG -- (Marketwire) -- 03/23/09 -- Safend, a leading provider of endpoint data protection solutions, today announced impressive growth and momentum in 2008, including a 50 percent increase in revenue and the addition of 550 new customers to its thriving customer base. The company also surpassed 1.7 million licenses in 30 different countries around the globe.

"In a difficult global economic climate, Safend continued to see success based on the strength of our solution offering and commitment to customer and partner satisfaction," said Gil Sever, Safend CEO. "2008 was a banner year for the company in which we introduced new products, significantly increased our customer base around the world and formed key partnerships that will enable us to help even more organizations protect their sensitive data. We are dedicated to continuing to expand and enhance our solution and customer service while progressing in the field of data protection in 2009."

Recent corporate milestones include:

Expanding Customer Install Base

"Due to significant investments in U.S. and European operations, 2008 was a breakthrough year for Safend in terms of customer adoption and software license sales," said Avishai Fishman, CFO of Safend. "We continued to pursue larger customers and have succeeded in winning deals involving large enterprises with tens of thousands of seats. We added more than 550 organizations to our worldwide customer base in 2008, bringing the total number of customers to over 1,200. Recent customer wins include numerous Fortune 500 global companies in all major verticals including Government, Healthcare, Finance and Retail."

Product Development

Last year, Safend significantly advanced its Data Protection Suite by releasing Safend Encryptor, Safend Protector Version 3.3 and Safend Reporter. Safend Encryptor utilizes Total Data Encryption technology that encrypts all data files and poses negligible performance impact on user productivity. It enforces an enterprise-wide policy which protects the data stored on PC and laptop hard drives so that sensitive data cannot be read by unauthorized users in the case of loss or theft.

With Safend Protector v3.3, large enterprises now benefit from the addition of load balancing, management by domain and increased options for organizations to manage their entire deployments through a single Safend Server. Safend Reporter is a data analysis tool that reports on data accessed by removable storage devices and wireless ports, providing extensive security and operational reporting that further enables data security and regulatory compliance. The tool provides a graphical, high-level view of the organization's status, allowing administrators to quickly and easily detect irregular or suspicious behavior. The Safend Data Protection Suite comprised of Safend Encryptor, Safend Protector, Safend Auditor and Safend Reporter, have a single agent with a single management console and server.

Safend also announced the automated Safend Quality Assurance and Interoperability Lab. By testing, in an automated fashion, the Safend solutions with mission-critical hardware, software and operating system technologies found in customer environments, Safend facilitates a seamless deployment of its solution in customers' existing IT infrastructure. Safend's solution is tested against 32 different Microsoft operating systems, an extensive list of more than 120 different software applications and 196 different drivers.

Partner Momentum

In 2008, Safend established several strategic partnerships and expanded existing partnerships to further its global reach and product offerings. Through existing partnerships with Utimaco (acquired by Sophos), Lenovo and Fujitsu BCS, Safend's breadth and depth of coverage expanded into 30 different countries. Safend formed a license partnership with security company CREDANT Technologies to create CREDANT Protector, which incorporates a rebranded version of Safend Protector into CREDANT's existing technology. Other partnerships include HP, WorkShare, BigFix, Kingston and IronKey.

Industry Accolades

This past year, Safend received industry recognition and praise from several respected organizations, including the "Best of Show" award from the Data Protection Summit, the "Global Excellence Award" from InfoSecurity Products and was ranked Number 31 on the 2008 Deloitte Israel Technology Fast 50, a ranking of the 50 fastest growing technology companies in Israel. The company also scored high marks for its Safend Protector, earning four out of five stars in SC Magazine's Endpoint Security Group Test, including five out of five stars in the "Ease of Use" and "Performance" categories.

About Safend

Safend is a leading provider of endpoint data protection solutions that protect against corporate data loss by offering comprehensive products for data encryption and port and device control. The Safend Suite encrypts internal and external hard drives, removable storage and CD/DVDs and provides granular control over all physical, wireless and removable media devices, ensuring compliance with regulatory data security and privacy standards. With more than 1,200 customers worldwide and 1.7 million licenses sold, Safend's solutions are deployed by multinational enterprises, government agencies and small to mid-size companies across the globe. Founded in 2003, Safend is a privately held company funded by Elron Electronics (NASDAQ: ELRN) (TASE: ELRN), Intel Capital and Walden Israel. Safend is headquartered in Tel Aviv with U.S. headquarters in Philadelphia. For more information, visit www.safend.com.