Cybersecurity firm Chronicle graduates from the X division and joins Alphabet

It took almost two years, but cybersecurity firm Chronicle finally “graduated” from Alphabet‘s somewhat secretive X division and made it to the big leagues.

For those not familiar with Chronicle, the company was founded in February 2016. Heading the company is Stephen Gillett, who co-founded it with former Google cybersecurity leaders Shapor Naghibzadeh and Mike Wiacek. Gillett was previously Starbucks’ chief information officer and Symantec’s chief operating officer.

Chronicle uses big data and machine learning to offer businesses an intelligence and analytics platform to “better manage and understand their own security-related data.”

In a blog post, Gillett says his company uses automated data analysis to lower the time it takes to discover an incident from hours or days to minutes. The company also looks to minimize customers’ data storage costs in order to make its technology more affordable.

In addition to its cybersecurity platform, Chronicle also maintains the VirusTotal malware intelligence system, which Google acquired in 2012.

Gillett says Chronicle will remain an independent company and operate under Alphabet’s umbrella. The executive also said his company is working with a number of Fortune 500 companies. Some of those companies are testing “a preview release of our new cybersecurity intelligence platform in an early alpha program.”

Cybersecurity is an interesting field for Google’s parent company to enter, but not entirely surprising. Consider the data breaches that affected the US Army and Navy, Equifax, and more, as well as several ransomware attacks.

In other words, the need for cybersecurity is stronger now than it has ever been, and Alphabet looks to profit from that need with its latest graduate.