SAIC [SAI] has acquired Atlan, Inc., a small laboratory company that conducts cyber security product testing as well as Federal Information Processing Standard (FIPS) 140-2 and 201 validations.

Terms of the deal were not disclosed. Atlan, which is based in Northern Virginia, has about 10 employees, half of which have security clearances. The company’s sales in its last fiscal year were about $2.3 million.

SAIC said the deal is a strategic acquisition that bolsters its cyber security capabilities and strengthens its position in the government cyber security certification market.

“The addition of Atlan’s FIPS testing capabilities enhances SAIC’s overall cyber security capabilities as well as our portfolio of Common Criteria, FIPS, and SCAP (secure content application protocol) testing services,” Larry Cox, senior vice president and business unit general manager at SAIC, said in a statement.

Atlan on its web site says it is the leading provider of FIPS 140-2 validations, conducting four out of every 10 validations last year.

For its part, Atlan said the deal would enable it to extend its work to the Common Criteria market as well as provide FIPS 140-2 and SACAP testing to a larger marketplace.

Atlan runs a laboratory that evaluates information technology security products against FIPS standards as well as offering testing services. Certification and testing are necessary to ensure that standards are met by cryptographic modules that collect, store, transfer, and share sensitive but unclassified information. These modules are used by federal government and regulated industries.

Some of Atlan’s customers include IBM [IBM], ITT Corp. [ITT], Canada’s SafeNet, Microsoft [MSFT], Cisco [CSCO] and Sun Microsystems [SUNW].

SAIC said that Atlan’s employees will join its Accredited Testing and Evaluation Laboratories under the company’s Intelligence and Information Solutions Business unit led by Cox.

The acquisition is another in a string of small deals by larger defense companies and information technology solutions providers that are expanding their capabilities in the cyber security market.