Cyber security for public cloud and ‘as-a-service’ grew strongly in 1Q2019

Cyber security solutions for public cloud and as-a-service grew by 46% year-on-year for the first quarter of the current year, the analyst firm Canalys says.

These solutions formed 17.6% of the cyber security spend, up from 13.8% in the corresponding period a year ago.

Virtual security appliances and agent solutions grew 18.2% on an annual basis while traditional hardware and software deployments dominated with almost 75% of the total, though they showed a much slower rate of growth at a little more than 8%.

The global cyber security market reached US$9.7 billion for the quarter, an increase of 14.2% from the US$8.5 billion in the first quarter of 2018.

“Investment in cyber security shows no sign of slowing down as it remains a priority for all organisations," said Canalys principal analyst Matthew Ball. "The security industry will be immune to the increasingly challenging macro-economic and political environment.

“Recent high-profile ransomware attacks have resulted in organisations paying large sums to regain access to critical IT systems and data. Strengthening security strategies across devices, infrastructure, perimeters and applications will continue to be critical.

"Increasing employee training and gaining more comprehensive cyber security insurance will also be important to counter these threats.”

Cisco, Palo Alto Networks, Symantec, Check Point and Fortinet were the top five vendors for the quarter, together accounting for 34.0% of the total. Cisco extended its lead in network security, though Palo Alto Networks and Fortinet continued to grow faster as all three took share.

McAfee, Symantec and Trend Micro continued to be market leaders in endpoint security, but CrowdStrike, Carbon Black and Cylance continued to make headway and showed the most growth. Symantec was the leader in Web and email security, while Trend Micro stood out for simplifying its licensing to enable customers to buy across different types.

“It will remain difficult for vendors to grow market share without significant investment or acquisitions, due to the current number of vendors active and increasing levels of competition,” said Canalys research analyst Claudio Stahnke.

“As new threats appear, more start-ups will emerge, adding to an already crowded market. Differentiation will be key, but also offering customers a choice of deployment and simplified licensing will be vital.

“The challenge for organisations in both the public and private sectors is to maintain pace with the evolving and diverse range of threats.

“Many will think they are too small or not high-profile enough to be targets, but hackers will seek to exploit any vulnerabilities. This is creating opportunities for channel partners to expand their capabilities to provide more holistic cyber security offerings to assess, recommend, deploy, integrate and manage multi-vendor solutions and services incorporating multiple deployment models.”

The channel made up 92.3% of shipment value in the first quarter of 2019.