Global Safety-Automation Leader Pilz Keeps Intellectual Property Safe with Liquid Machines

Liquid Machines Enterprise Rights Management Empowers Pilz to Protect Market Leadership in Highly-Competitive Industry by Persistently Protecting Confidential Information

Waltham, Mass. - June 30, 2008

Liquid Machines®, Inc., the leader in Enterprise Rights Management (ERM) solutions, today announced that Pilz, the global leader in safety automation equipment, has deployed Liquid Machines enterprise rights management solutions throughout its global infrastructure to prevent data loss from internal and external sources. Pilz implemented ERM to protect critical research and development (R&D) files, human resources, product and marketing information from unauthorized access, loss or manipulation.

 

While Pilz owns 65 percent of the global safety and controls market, the company continues to reinvest over 40 percent of its profits in research and development to maintain its competitive advantage in product design and development innovation. To persistently protect its product plans and designs from leaking to competitors, Pilz explored technologies that would bolster its existing information protection program without constraining its collaborative research and design process. After an in-depth evaluation of vendors and solutions, Pilz chose and deployed Liquid Machines to persistently protect information regardless of its location and easily define and enforce multiple security policies to its intellectual property without interrupting their collaborative and innovative environment.

 

“Liquid Machines’ unique approach to ERM protects information at rest, in transit and in use and enables Pilz to collaborate across the globe with confidence while not interfering with our innovative workplace,” said Steve Farrow, Managing Director, Pilz. “After an extensive review of solutions, we chose Liquid Machines because they made it easy for our business users and IT staff to work with protected information without affecting existing workflows. Liquid Machines’ flexible policies allow us to safeguard the company’s infrastructure from common causes of data loss such as mobile employees, computer theft and employees that are leaving the company for a competitor.”

 

“Pilz understands that the key to its competitive advantage is ensuring the security of its intellectual property and confidential files from both external hackers as well as insider threats,” said Mike Ruffolo, chairman and CEO at Liquid Machines. “All it takes is one instance of unauthorized access for data to be inadvertently leaked to a competitor or to the public, resulting in the loss of competitive advantage. With Liquid Machines, Pilz puts the protection and control with the data, giving the company the confidence and control needed to enable collaboration while ensuring persistent information protection wherever it resides. This enables Pilz to focus on driving innovation and growing its market share.”

 

Protection, Collaboration and Automation

Liquid Machines’ solutions persistently control access to and usage of electronic files regardless of where they exist—even outside the office —without changing the way users work. Pilz chose Liquid Machines’ easily-implemented technology largely because of its ability to encrypt and persistently protect all data while providing a seamless and automated experience for the end users at Pilz, resulting in minimal impact on existing workflows and employee behavior. Benefits include:

• Protection: In addition to R&D related files, product and HR records, clients’ financial information is also shared with various outside partners and stakeholders and Pilz needed to extend the Liquid Machines solution to ensure data is in the right hands for the right reasons. Because of this, Liquid Machines’ support for more than 400 file formats was a competitive differentiator. Liquid Machines also collects a digital audit trail of information usage in support of corporate governance and industry compliance requirements, giving Pilz confidence that its information is not reaching the competition.

 

• Collaboration: Liquid Machines provides Pilz with collaborative benefits such as offline and expiration controls. Unlike other ERM solutions, Liquid Machines provides superior offline support, allowing users to work with and share protected information while outside the office or disconnected from the network. Instead, the product’s expiration feature allows mobile users to access encrypted information from a Pilz server and continue to work with it even without an Internet connection. If the user’s laptop does not check in with the central Liquid Machines server within a configured timeframe, the information becomes inaccessible. Pilz can also assign expiration dates to data so team members collaborating worldwide are using the most current project files. Using this unique feature, Pilz is able to revoke rights to all outdated plans or schematics the moment an updated version of the document is available to prevent the usage of outdated specifications.

 

• Automation: Liquid Machines enables Pilz to automate the protection process by protecting the contents of networked file shares. Policies control which users have access to specified files based on directory or folder location, as well as the action those users take on file including open, read, write, save, save as, copy/paste and print. As files are saved to, or created in, a protected file share, policies are automatically applied. Files are automatically protected using industry-standard encryption technology.

Liquid Machines also announced today that Pilz has been selected by Computerworld’s Infrastructure Management World (IMW) Conference, the premier event for leaders in the data center and infrastructure management sector, as an Honoree of its “Best Practices in Infrastructure Management” Awards Program in the category of “Security, Compliance and Risk Management” for its deployment of enterprise rights management technology [see related release: “Computerworld’s Infrastructure Management World Names Pilz as an Honoree Of Its “Best Practices in Infrastructure Management” Awards Program”].

 

A full case study detailing the motivating factors behind Pilz’ decision to deploy Liquid Machines’ ERM solutions and its subsequent success is available to the general public on the Liquid Machines web site: www.liquidmachines.com/customer-case-pilz.

 

About Pilz GmbH & Co. KG

Pilz GmbH is Europe’s largest and most-respected maker of safety automation equipment, offers leading-edge safe automation solutions and control products. Products include sensor technology, electrical monitoring relays, automation solutions with motion control, safety relays, programmable safety and control systems and an operating and monitoring range. Safe bus systems are also available for industrial networking. Pilz also provides a comprehensive range of consulting, engineering and training services. Accredited consultants are available for worldwide services for risk assessment, safety concept, safety design, CE services and safety sign-off. For more information, see www.pilz.com.

 

About Liquid Machines

Liquid Machines is the leading provider of enterprise rights management (ERM) solutions that prevent the misuse, modification, loss or theft of intellectual property and sensitive information. By applying access and usage controls to the data itself, electronic information is persistently protected while at rest, in transit and in use—empowering employees to securely collaborate and work with native file formats and applications. Liquid Machines enables global companies in the financial services, government, manufacturing, retail and healthcare industries to protect intellectual property regardless of where it goes, generating detailed access and usage reports that demonstrate compliance with privacy and industry regulations. Based in Waltham, Massachusetts, Liquid Machines is privately held and is backed by Atlas Venture, Draper Fisher Jurvetson, Goldman Sachs & Co, Masthead Venture Partners and RRE Ventures. For more information on the company and its vision for The Freedom of Security™, please visit www.liquidmachines.com.

© 2008 Liquid Machines, Inc. All rights reserved. Liquid Machines Product or company names mentioned herein may be the trademarks of their respective owners. The information contained in this document represents the current view of Liquid Machines, Inc. on the issues discussed as of the date of publication.

For More Information:

Ed Harrison
fama PR
617-758-4144
liquidmachines@famapr.com