RSSSymantec Gets Tax Bill of $1 Billion
By Ed Oswald | Published April 18, 2006, 12:30 PM
While some may have had to pay quite a bit back to Uncle Sam this year, not many will owe as much as security software firm Symantec. The company disclosed late Monday that it had received notice from the Internal Revenue Service saying it owes up to $1 billion in back taxes and penalties.
The $900 million in taxes plus interest and penalties are mostly due to back taxes owed by Veritas, a company Symantec purchased for $10 billion in July 2005. Veritas owed taxes for the 2000 and 2001 tax years, a fact that was discovered after an audit.
However, an additional audit Symantec itself has turned up an additional $100 million in taxes from the 2003 and 2004 years. That total excludes interest and penalties.
Symantec said it would contest the judgment and planned to file a petition. In a filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission, the company said it would not make any payments until the issue was definitely resolved.
"[Symantec] strongly believes the IRS positions with regard to these matters are inconsistent with applicable tax laws and existing Treasury regulations, and that its previously reported income tax provision for the years in question is appropriate," it said in the filing.
The security software company has seen its stock price drop precipitously since December 2004, when it first announced the Veritas acquisition. Since then, its shares have dropped some 40 percent. Additionally, several of Symantec's high-ranking executives have also left the company.
What I dislike about symantec is their customer support, specifically with the 2005 AV product.
It's nice to see a company that screwed my company get screwed by someone else.
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|...and then falling into its own trap...I like that
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|I don't know about you others, but I really think Norton is slowing down my computer quite a bit. I think McAfee is quite better.
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|Honestly the number of comments badmouthing Symantec is astounding. Their Corporate AV is outstanding. By far the fastest, most efficient antivirus I've ever seen managed or unmanaged.
For the home user I really have yet to see a satisfactory anti-virus. McAfee sucks just as bad as Norton AV and all the freebie AV clients I've tried bog down my machine to the point of crashing it.
Symantec has more than just AV products though. Norton Ghost, Partition Magic, System Tools (which actually really does help your machine believe it or not), just to name a few.
And people complain about AV Subscriptions but in reality it makes sense. It may seem like your buying a product but paying yearly to use it but your paying the AV developer to stay on top of things and know about the latest viruses and how to stop them.
Perhaps you'd feel more comfortable with installing your AV client and hoping to God that no new viruses come out between now and next year when you buy the newer version of your AV Client?
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|Valid points, but most people do not have experience with the corporate av (unless they are pirating.
Ghost and Partition Magic are still valuable tools, but I have little use for SystemWorks.
The antivirus program for home users is acceptable, but it does bog down a machine--there is simply no way around it. The Internet Suite is unflexible and prone to odd problems In the past week alone, I have worked on two machines that NIS simply shut someone off of the Internet completely. I suspect the user did something, but the real issue is that it does not allow a typical user to easily UNDO something.
For me though, Symantec's abyssmal support is reason I can no longer recommend its products. For a home user who has an issue resulting in the need to reinstall a norton product, the time on hold required to activate their products is surreal. I have NEVER spent less than 45 minutes on hold just to re-activate, and I generally spend 1.5 hours plus. That is unacceptable when a company demands that you activate software. Microsoft Windows, by comparison, has a relatively painless 5 minute max phone call. I'm all for thwarting piracy, but when you treat your customers this way, Symantec deserves what it gets as far as bad PR (though I disagree they should have to pay $1 billion for an undisclosed issue from a company they bought).
But as for people bad mouthing their products....what goes around comes around.
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|Symantec's past history alone is enough to turn of most techies.
While I will admit the Corp AV client is better than McAfee, outside of corporate use, it's crap.
If you're looking for a decent Home AV solution, I strongly suggest you check out NOD32. It's fast, lightweight, and consistantly updated.
GHOST - Written by Ghostsoft.
Partition Magic - written by Powerquest
System Tools - Crap. Really.
Seeing a pattern here? If they didn't write it...it's decent. Go figure.
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|"Ghost and Partition Magic are still valuable tools"
Quite possibly because they were, in fact, not created by Symantec, but by GhostSoft and PowerQuest respectively.
...just sayin'.
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|They deserve this for scaming their clients to get new versions of crap software year by year with only new number at the end. And all products work like sh*t.
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|I'm just wandering if the comments over here would be the same if Symantec owed a billion in taxes to the EU?
I haven't heard comments like; stupid, commies, dumba**es, only after their money, etc. so i guess there is some kind of double standard.
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|LOL quite true. :P
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|Either that...or we all really hate Symantec.
Take your pick.
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|My guess is that (the most of) you hate the both of them... :)
edit: oh yeah i forgot; so if you don't like them it doesn't matter if they have to pay a billion dollars. This brings things into perspective. Everybody not liking the EU -> MS must be right.
Also funny to see that nearly all the comments are about Symantects products and not about its quarel with the IRS.
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|This is great news for me! Ever since they bought out Sygate and left a bad taste in my mouth I've wanted revenage.
However, I do feel bad for the people that use Symantec products because they will pay this debt in the end.
On that note, I should write the following to my family;
"Dear, Grandpa. Please expect your next Symantec subscription to be double the price it is now. I apologize in advance for your computer manufacture putting a 6 month trial of this software on your computer which gives you a false sense of security. Then again, they put Windows on it too...anyways good luck and G'bless."
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"Corp. AV is great" only for the simple use. The detection Symantec offers is simply pathetic.
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|""Corp. AV is great" only for the simple use. The detection Symantec offers is simply pathetic."
Can you provide any examples of better Corporate Antivirus software?
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|IRS finally go after the big fishes.
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|well that now i wouldnt want to be the one to pay for that bill.
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|never this motto made so much sense http://tinyurl.com/2sz4n
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|Symantec isn't a bad company; they just have some bad products...some, not all. As for the tax debt. When you acquire a company, you assume all debt and liability. Someone is going to burn for this one. Before the acquisition was completed, Symantec would have done an audit of Vertis' books and tax filings.
Basically, they missed it and now they have to pay. And a pretty large group of people within Symantec's accounting firm will probably go down if flames...publicly.
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|Symantec may be a bad company. They may have the worst products in the Universe. However, this is an issue that has absolutely nothing to do with that. My gut says the IRS is right, being they usually don't just accuse multi-billion dollar companies based on a hunch. If Symantec is right, they should contest this.
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|Using Corporate AV and loving it, never bugs you for any reason, doesn't use up resources like other AVs. Ghost had some issues, but it's still a great program.
I'm sure they won't have to pay that much, those taxes are not their.
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|Agreed on the first point. Corp AV is great.
On the second point I can only half agree with you. I am sure they won't have to pay that much, the IRS will probly settle for less, they almost always do. However, you say that "those taxes are not their", that isn't correct. Both Veritas and Symantec independently owe back taxes, however now that Veritas is owned by Symantec they will owe it all.
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|Dear Symantec:
May i suggest some type of lubricant, ...
scented vaseline perhaps ??
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|Veritaseline?
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|bendover exec 11.2?
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|Yippee!!! Woohoo!!! Quite hilarious!!!
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|Norton Tax Doctor?
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|+5 Funny.
That was great...
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|More bad news for Symantec.
Lovely. Absolutely dee-lish.
Couldn't have happened to a more deserving comapny.
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