Symantec Corporation NASDAQ: SYMC, founded in 1982, is an information security company headquartered in Cupertino, California that now specializes in computer security and antivirus software.

Symantec first became well-known as the publisher of Q & A, an extraordinary dual-mode product that was both a word processor and a database. During the 1990s, Symantec switched focus away from development of its own products and towards acquisition of other companies. An early purchase gave Symantec ownership of the famous Norton Utilities, created in the mid 1980s by software engineer Peter Norton. At one time Symantec was also known for its development tools, particularly the Think Pascal, Think C, and Symantec C++ systems that were particularly popular on the Macintosh platform; they exited this business in the late 90s as competitors such as Metrowerks stole significant market share.

In recent years, Symantec has been primarily known for its Norton-branded antivirus and utility software. Products released under the Symantec name include Norton AntiVirus, Norton Commander, Norton Internet Security, Norton Personal Firewall, Norton SystemWorks (which now contains the venerable Norton Utilities), Norton AntiSpam, Norton GoBack (formerly Roxio GoBack), and Norton Ghost (originally published by Binary Research).

Due to the recent acquisition of PowerQuest, Symantec now produces the newest versions of PartitionMagic, now called Norton PartitionMagic. This is true as well of the Netware partition manager, PowerQuest ServerMagic, now called Symantec ServerMagic. Drive Image has become Norton Ghost, replacing the original program.

The Symantec Security Response organization (formerly Symantec Antivirus Research Center) is one of the foremost antivirus and computer security research groups in the industry.

On December 16, 2004, VERITAS and Symantec announced their plans for a merger. With VERITAS valued at $13.5 billion, it was the largest software industry merger to date.

Symantec's shareholders on June 24, 2005 voted to approve the company's merger with VERITAS, and the deal closed successfully on July 2nd. July 5, 2005 was the first day of business for U.S. offices of the new, combined software company.

Acquisitions

Symantec has acquired many companies which gave it the technologies that it uses to produce its current software. For the list of acquisitions, see List of Symantec acquisitions.

See also

• John W. Thompson
• Gordon Eubanks (former CEO)
• Category:Symantec software

External links

• Symantec Corp
• Official website of VERITASde:Symantec

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