From left to right: Andrei Homescu, Per Larsen, Stephen Crane, Michael Franz and Immunant’s summer intern, Julian Lettner.

A tiny computer security company has been working quietly at the Cove to develop ways of protecting mobile systems against hackers. Immunant builds specialized tools for developers. The company’s software transforms the way code is compiled, linked, and loaded by a host operating system. This three-person company’s reputation in the security community belies its actual size. “Our industry is relationship-heavy,” says Stephen Crane, Immunant’s CTO. “We have built up credibility over years of collaborations. This is a premium advantage in a field with a huge amount of snake oil. A lot of companies promise more security than they can deliver on.” Meanwhile, the tools Immunant is developing could improve system security for hundreds of millions of mobile network users by safeguarding the computers that act as the nodes of communications networks from hacking incursions.

Immunant was co-founded by three graduate and post-doctoral researchers at the UCI School of Information and Computing Sciences (ICS); Per Larsen, Andrei Homescu, and Crane. Their advisor, UCI Professor of Computing Science, Michael Franz, also has a stake in the startup.

Read the full story on the UCI Applied Innovation website.