EXCLUSIVE-Cybersecurity firm Trend Micro explores sale, sources say

By Milana Vinn Aug 8 (Reuters) - Trend Micro (4704.T) , a Japanese cybersecurity firm with a market value of about 950 billion yen ($6.5 billion), is exploring a sale after attracting buyout interest, people familiar with the matter said on Thursday. The deal deliberations come as a weakening of the yen in the last few weeks, and Trend Micro’s stock underperformance compared to Japanese peers, have made it an acquisition target. Trend Micro is working with investment bankers to solicit interest from potential buyers, which include private equity firms, the sources said, cautioning that no deal is certain. The sources requested anonymity because the discussions are confidential. Trend Micro did not immediately respond to requests for comment. Founded in 1988 by technology industry executives Steve Chang, Jenny Chang, and Eva Chen as an anti-virus software maker, Trend Micro has expanded its offerings to cloud computing, network, and endpoint security. Trend Micro’s shares have lost more than 10% of their value since the start of the year, underperforming the broader Japanese market and many of its peers, as the company battles to improve its profitability while competing with large U.S. rivals such as Crowdstrike (CRWD.O) , Microsoft (MSFT.O) and Palo Alto Networks (PANW.O) . The Tokyo-based company has been seeking to take market share from Crowdstrike after a global outage last month caused by a Crowdstrike software update crashed more than 8 million computers and wrecked havoc from aviation to healthcare. Earlier on Thursday, Trend Micro reported a 13% year-over-year increase in second-quarter net sales to 68.6 million yen and an even bigger 42% rise in second-quarter operating income to 12.3 million yen, which it attributed to improving its operating margin to 18%. Dealmaking in the cybersecurity industry has been on the rise amid an increase in spending on security software from large global corporations. In July, Google parent Alphabet attempted to strike a $23-billion deal to buy cybersecurity startup Wiz before the talks fizzled out.