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Three cyber-security organizations — CyberPoint International, Vir2us Inc. and the newly formed Security Technology Institute — plan to open in Baltimore and collectively provide more than 100 new jobs over the next couple of years.

CyberPoint International, which just began operations last month, has 10 employees and plans to hire 100 more. The company moved into temporary space at an Inner Harbor building Monday and plans to open a permanent office Jan. 1.

CyberPoint is a cyber security-related engineering and technical services company founded by Karl Gumtow, a longtime Maryland resident who previously was vice president and director of the intelligence and space business unit of SRA International of Fairfax, Va., and COO of RABA Technologies, an SRA subsidiary.

CyberPoint plans to add "more than 100 new positions over the next two years," Gumtow said in a statement. "We believe that the cyber security market opportunity ultimately will be what delivers on the vision of the Digital Harbor."

Vir2us, which aims to improve computer security through rapid innovation, moved last week from California's Silicon Valley into Baltimore's Emerging Technology Center.

"Our decision to move was in large part due to the support we received from [the Security Technology Institute] and its programs, which we plan to take advantage of in order to capitalize on the government market opportunity," said CEO George L. Herron, former chief scientist at cyber-security giant McAfee of Santa Clara, Calif., in a statement.

"Vir2us was previously based in San Francisco, but we moved our headquarters last week to the [Emerging Technology Center] incubator in order to be close to early adopters of our products (government, military and critical infrastructures), and especially to be close to our new strategic partners in the Security Technology Institute," Herron said.

Herron said Vir2us has four employees with plans to hire 25 more in the coming months. The company's "immunity" technology addresses major cyber-security problems by fundamentally changing how computers work, thus making make cyber threats irrelevant, he said.

Security Technology Institute, a nonprofit, public-private partnership that is to begin operations in the incubator Tuesday, plans to launch programs it says will help position the state as a global leader in the expanding cyber-security technology industry.

"Cyber Security and other related security technologies represent an unparalleled economic development opportunity for Maryland," said CEO Allen C. Shay in a statement. "Leveraging as seed capital some of the $30 billion in federal spending projected for cyber security, STI is focused on recruiting promising new security technologies and technology companies to Maryland, and assisting in the development of new homegrown technology companies that ultimately will create vibrant domestic and export markets for their products and services."

A team from the institute was recently invited to the United Kingdom as guests of the U.K Trade Ministry to meet with 17 new security technology companies, according to institute information. Other outreach programs are planned in both the U.S. and abroad this winter.