23 billion dollars

Google parent Alphabet about to make its biggest acquisition

The search engine giant is said to be flirting with the purchase of the security company Wiz.

(Bild: dpa/Ole Spata)

Alphabet is apparently on the verge of its biggest takeover. According to insiders, the Google parent company is in advanced talks to purchase the data security company Wiz for around 23 billion US dollars (around 21 billion euros). 

This was reported by the "Wall Street Journal" at the weekend, citing insiders. A deal could therefore be announced soon, but is not yet in the bag.

Wiz was only founded in 2020 and offers cybersecurity software for cloud data centers. This is an important area at Google, but one that lags behind the offerings of Amazon Web Services and Microsoft Azure. The Bloomberg news agency also reported on the impending acquisition, citing an unnamed person.

Increased monitoring
Takeovers on such a scale are rather rare for US tech giants, partly because they are under increased scrutiny from the antitrust authorities. Google is currently facing charges from the US Department of Justice for allegedly exploiting its market power in online search to hinder competition.

Wiz is one of the few start-ups that does not originate from the hype surrounding artificial intelligence and has nevertheless increased its market valuation. Earlier this year, Wiz raised a cash injection of one billion dollars at a total valuation of twelve billion dollars.