ServiceNow, a provider of digital workflow management solutions, is buying Belgian startup Sweagle to help customers keep their software up and running.
Sweagle is a pioneer in IT configuration management automation, using machine learning to identify and help prevent potentially costly software configuration glitches.
Organizations often must navigate 50,000 or more configuration data items to make a single enterprise application work correctly, ServiceNow said in announcing Monday it would acquire Sweagle for an undisclosed amount.
“With Sweagle, ServiceNow customers can quickly deploy applications and infrastructure as code changes more frequently on a single data platform,” it added.
As TechCrunch reports, “With more companies moving workers home, making sure your systems are up and running has become more important than ever. ServiceNow, which includes in its product catalog an IT help desk component, recognizes that help desks have been bombarded during the [coronavirus] pandemic.”
Configuration errors can cause shutdowns, security issues, and other serious problems for enterprises.
“With capabilities for configuration data management from Sweagle, we will empower devops teams to deliver application and infrastructure changes more rapidly while reducing risk,” said RJ Jainendra, ServiceNow’s vice president and general manager of DevOps and IT Business Management.
Sweagle was founded in 2017 and raised $4.05 million on a post-valuation of $11.88 million, according to PitchBook data. “Today, configuration data is as important as having good code — and this is the foundation that Sweagle was built on,” Sweagle CEO and co-founder Mark Verstockt said.
“Every day something goes wrong in a company related to bad configuration data,” he added. “Together, we can help customers deliver higher-quality applications without the need for manual work, all while reducing cost.”
ServiceNow joins a number of larger companies that have been acquiring startups during the pandemic, including VMware, Atlassian, and NetApp, which have purchased Ocatarine, Halp, and Spot, respectively, in recent months.
In trading Monday, ServiceNow shares rose 0.3% to $401. The stock has climbed more than 57% since the pandemic forced many companies to have employees work from home.