Plausible Deniability

Привет! from Moscow! I’m here attending Russian anti malware vendor Kaspersky Lab’s annual press and analyst event — an intensive two day love fest of talks from senior executives and Kaspersky virus analysts. Like similar events by Symantec, McAfee, Trend and the like, this is all about Kaspersky owning the message for a couple days.

And so it goes here, with Kaspersky PR and marketing folks escorting a cadre of reporters through a Kaspersky-tinted view of the world. Access to company executives is in abundance, but it should be no surprise that reporters plucked from their home cities and taken on an all-expense paid trip to a strange land are disinclined to question their hosts and handlers too closely. Asked by one intrepid reporter what he estimated the market value of his company to be, CEO Eugene Kaspersky went silent before flashing a wide grin and shouting back “enough to pay for your dinner!” And that…was…that!

Despite its size (the company now employs over 1,200 people worldwide), Kaspersky is still very much a personality-driven company, and the personality who drives it is Eugene Kaspersky. He’s everywhere here in Moscow: presiding over the morning sessions, briefing reporters and analysts, toasting the assembled at gala dinners and holding court over shots of (excellent) Russian vodka in the hotel lobby late into the evening. In a nation of chronically unsmiling people, Eugene is ebullient: bearded and grinning as he bounds about greeting and joshing with his guests like a younger, scruffier Santa Claus.

The very act of flying four or five dozen reporters to Moscow in December just to show them around his company speaks volumes about Kaspersky’s personal ambition. He’s doubtless been counseled by others to play down the company’s Russian connections (Kaspersky is officially incorporated in the UK). But he’ll have none of it and, in fact, wants to play it up. He takes seriously the idea that his company will be a beacon to other Russian IT firms that — in the words of COO Evgeny Buyakin — Russia can produce “more than just oil and gas.” His fellow executives and employees seem to take it seriously too and — the Russians among them — to consider it a point of pride to work for a home grown firm that’s taking on much larger and richer U.S., European and Asian operations like Symantec, McAfee, Trend and Sophos.

Of course, getting a modern IT company to thrive in a business environment dominated by connected firms whose wealth is tied to natural resources like oil, timber and mining will be no small feat. Western critics and opinion makers need convincing, and Kaspersky faced pointed questions about whether his company may have unwittingly hired black hats and cyber criminals to work in its labs. It’s a fair enough question for any security company (especially given recent revelations in the TJX case), but I didn’t hear it asked of anyone at Symantec Vision in Las Vegas.

As a venue, Moscow both helps and hurts. The place is booming — no doubt about it — with new office buildings going up all over the city, luxury automobiles beached on the sidewalks, and giant plasma screens perched above the main boulevards displaying luxury ads. But the Freudian term “unheimlich” — literally “un-homey” or “uncanny”– comes to mind in a place where old and new come together so jarringly. Doors fly open for us in the very capable hands of Kaspersky and crew. The man is, after all, something of a national hero. But there’s also a palpable sense that layers of deep complexity lie beneath the seamless production here that might easily trip up a smaller firm making a go of it. San Jose this ain’t.

As for Kaspersky, the company, its executives agree that the biggest challenge facing the company will be managing growth in the coming years — holding onto the spark that animates the company today, but also developing the systems and processes that large companies need to operate. The company is working to secure a partnership (and possibly an additional investment) with Credit Suisse. That, it is hoped, will open doors to Western enterprises, and Western markets for a possible IPO. Given the turmoil in world markets, however, those plans have almost certainly been pushed back and we imagine Kaspersky is counting its lucky stars that it can hide out from the tumolt as a privately held firm for the time being. We’ll be writing more about Kaspersky in the days ahead — its roadmaps and strategic considerations. But often its the details around the edges that tell the most interesting story. In the case of Kaspersky Lab, that’s definitely true.