Security solution provider sees opportunity to work with VARs and MSPs alike to grow business
LAKE BUENA VISTA, FLA. – Just moths after being turned on to the possibility of bringing its portfolio of managed security services to market through third parties, Winnipeg-based Seccuris used the TechSelect Fall conference here to reach out to their community members with the opportunity.
Seccuris, a longtime TechSelect member, was introduced to the idea when the opportunity emerged to provide outsourced security services to Japanese telecom giant KDDI for its U.S. business. While KDDI was able to provide security-related managed services in its homeland and in other arenas, it sought a partner to handle those services in North America, and came to work with Seccuris on it.
And with that partnership in place, why not grow the business by working with others, said Harold Hermann, director of sales and marketing for Seccuris.
The company has put its Security Information and Event Manager (SIEM) system into KDDI’s NOC in New York City, and is monitoring from back home in Winnipeg. And now it’s looking to build up partnerships in Canada through its TechSelect partnerships.
“It brought to our attention the fact that we have something here that we believe can be resold through other organizations, and we’re looking to do it in Canada,” Hermann told TechSelect attendees.
Managed security services on offer from the company include threat monitoring – an active and ongoing oversight of a customer’s networks for any attacks or attempted attacks, and vulnerability assessments, provided either on a one-off or ongoing assessment of a customer’s strengths and weaknesses when it comes to security.
With security being an increasingly important underpinning of a wide variety of solutions – Hermann walked partners through many aspects of the wildly growing security “threatscape” in his presentation here – the company sees broad opportunity for partners ranging from simple referral to more traditional project-based resellers, to a recurring integration with partners who have moved further along into managed services.
For more traditional resellers, Hermann’s pitch is the ability to move more into the solutions sale mode and provide required services in an easy-to-obtain method. These types of partners would likely be primarily paid on a referral basis, although he said Seccuris is open to all kinds of partner engagement, including ones where the partner is the primary source of interaction.
For MSPs, it’s a “buy vs. build” decision and he described Seccuris’ offerings as “virtually plug and play” with existing managed services, bringing the advantage of quicker time to market and flexibility in how Seccuris and partner works together – under Seccuris’ name, co-branded, or on a white-label basis.
And for both types of partners, the company has a unique differentiator for Canadian customers – a Level 2 Secret Security Operations Centre located on Canadian soil, outside the potentially worries of Canadian customer data being subject to the U.S. Patriot Act.
“In competitive situations, we’re winning because of the Canadian SOC,” he said.
Hermann said the partner plan is in its infancy today, but the plan is to eventually offer a full partner program including a self-service portal, joint marketing programs and even Seccuris managed security packaged “SKUed up” by Tech Data Canada.
“We have the certifications, we have the bandwidth to bring on ne customers, and we can grow this business pretty quickly,” Hermann told attendees.
Karen Kabel, technology consultant and Seccuris and a TechSelect Canada community mainstay, said the company intends to work first within the TechSelect community to build up a channel of partners for its managed services offerings. It’s part of the TechSelect spirit of helping fellow members grow their business and find new avenues for profitability, she said.
About Robert Dutt
Robert Dutt is the founder and head blogger at ChannelBuzz.ca. He has been covering the Canadian solution provider channel community for a variety of publications and Web sites since 1997.
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