. Symantec has operations in more than 40 countries and over 17,500 employees. A major source of Symantec’s growth since the company’s creation in the 1980s has been the acquisition of other companies, including Norton, Bright mail, Altiris, and many smaller software developers. In 2005, the company made its largest "acquisition to date, acquiring Veritas Software for l approximately $13.5 billion in what was the largest l software industry merger ever at that time.