Exclusive: Intel Security CTO Michael Fey joins Blue Coat as COO

By Jim Finkle and Supantha Mukherjee

(Reuters) - Michael Fey has left Intel Security Group to become chief operating officer at Blue Coat Systems Inc, a privately owned network security company.

Fey was one of the few top McAfee managers to stay with the company after it was bought by Intel Corp in 2011. McAfee is now part of Intel Security Group, where Fey had been chief technology officer.

Fey told Reuters his role at Blue Coat would be "very similar" to his previous job. "But I get to focus on the cloud and the advanced threats space more," he said.

"Blue Coat had tremendous growth behind the scenes and now I get to focus on taking that growth and trying to get it to the billion-dollar revenue mark," he said in a telephone interview.

McAfee confirmed Fey's departure in an email.

Since the $7.7 billion acquisition by Intel, McAfee has lost senior managers and key talent in technology development, research and sales.

At Blue Coat, Fey will replace David Murphy, who will stay on as a strategic adviser to the board.

"David has been an extremely important person in the company and he remains a substantial shareholder and one of our key go-to people for strategy," Blue Coat Chief Executive Greg Clark told Reuters.

Blue Coat, bought by San Francisco-based private equity firm Thoma Bravo for $1.3 billion in February 2012, operates in an area where businesses and governments are spending more to counter and contain cyber security threats.

Worldwide spending on information security will increase 7.9 percent to $71.1 billion in 2014 and a further 8.2 percent in 2015 to reach $76.9 billion, Gartner said in a report.

Clark said Blue Coat was "on the trajectory" to meet its $1 billion annual revenue target in the next 36 months. He declined to disclose the company's current revenue.

(Additional reporting by Lehar Maan in Bengaluru; Editing by Robin Paxton)