Kaspersky Lab may not be a household name in the United States, but in some parts of the world, it's the most popular consumer antivirus software. In China the company boasts 100 million users, and the software is also popular in Germany, and, of course, Russia, where Kaspersky got its start in 1997.

A graduate of Russia's Institute of Cryptography, Telecommunications and Computer Science, company co-founder and CEO Eugene Kaspersky got his start licensing antivirus engines to other companies instead of selling directly to consumers, and that licensing income remains a large part of Kaspersky Lab's business. The company counts Juniper, BlueCoat and CheckPoint among its partners. During the Russian economic crash of 1998, U.S. dollars from these foreign contracts kept the company afloat, and today IDC ranks it the number-four antivirus company worldwide.
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