Arxan Technologies has thrown its weight behind the Federation Against Software Theft (The Federation) after announcing an assault on the UK market.

The Microsoft and Red Hat strategic partner, which specialises in application hardening, has joined the war on piracy by collaborating with The Federation in market awareness and education seminars.

The US based vendor also revealed plans to take on at least five resellers to penetrate the UK market.

Amena Ali, chief marketing officer at Arxan, said: “In about nine months to year Arxan will begin to recruit UK partners to develop its market reach.

“Although piracy is high in Europe enterprises appear more concerned with software tampering than piracy. Arxan’s product is focused on the application level not network security, as most hacks take place at the binary level.”

The vendor’s GuardIT platform focuses on the reduction of IP theft, software tampering and theft.

The binary-based solution provides software protection across Windows, .NET and Linux desktop, server and embedded platforms for both x86 and Power PC.

Recent research by industry body the Business Software Association (BSA) and analyst IDC concluded that worldwide losses due to piracy increased by $8bn to a total of $48bn in 2007 alone. In the UK alone piracy has flat lined at 26-27 per cent for the last four years.

John Lovelock, chief executive of The Federation, said: “Britain’s creative industries are the envy of the rest of the world - but only while intellectual property is respected. We all have a duty to make sure we safeguard this national treasure - just like the rest of the world protects the rights of their workers.

SoftPiracy“Without protection the UK loses its advantage and its copyrighted works get stolen, leading to job loses, lost tax revenue, and criminals profiting. The Federation therefore welcomes any initiative in the fight against piracy and tampering.”

To coincide with its UK launch Arxan has appointed a new vice president of international sales, Lance Boyd, who will be supported by a London based team.