Mike Williams, Chief Revenue Officer of SecureAuth speaks with Channel Post MEA in detail about the evolving trends in the cybersecurity space and the importance of channel for his company growth in the Middle East.
How would you describe the cybersecurity landscape in the Middle East & Africa?
Cybersecurity challenges and cyberthreats are global. Ransomware attacks and the Middle East and Africa landscape do not appear to be different. We also recognize that individual countries and regions have their own unique requirements in solving these challenges, and that’s where SecureAuth’s flexible approach is differentiated in markets such as the Middle East and Africa. We provide identity and access management for SaaS, hybrid, on-premise environments. We understand the specific identity security needs of the Middle East and Africa.
What are the major trends have you witnessed in cybersecurity since the world was stuck by COVID-19 pandemic last year?
The fact of the matter is that we took an entire workforce and threw them into being full-time, remote employees when the pandemic struck. Now, most employees are going back twice a week, which appears to be the norm. Now, more than a year later, organizations are concerned not only about securing data, digital identities, and networks, but turnover will be an issue if employees are made to go back to the office full-time. The trend is enterprises are supposed to be able to look after their own corporate assets in-house and the remote workforce assets. This environment continually demands a framework of zero-trust starting with identity, whether at home or the office, no matter where we are. Organizations are struggling with who is entering the network and what they are accessing how and when.
Another trend is ransomware, as we have seen an uptick, and it is due to insufficient identity protection. As a hybrid model of working from home is proven productive, security and adaptive authentication will continue to be a trend.
How have SecureAuth adapted to these trends and upgrade, enhanced, tweaked or launched new products or solutions?
We are rooted in pillars of identity security, leveraging flexibility and adaptability for enterprises deploying on-premise and hybrid environments worldwide.
SecureAuth introduced the SecureAuth Identity Store, a privacy-focused cloud directory, that directly addresses the existing identity management issues with non-core workforce and customer identity and access management (CIAM). The SecureAuth Identity Store’s built-in privacy controls allow global companies to identify user PII and to comply with each regional privacy framework such as GDPR or CCPA. The controls extend to the Right-To-Be-Forgotten (triggered via API or user profile), allowing companies to pseudonymize PII after executing RTBF.
Also introduced in May, SecureAuth Mobile SDK, is an industry-first mobile SDK to provide adaptive multi-factor authentication with push-to-accept notifications for custom branded mobile apps. The SecureAuth Mobile SDK addresses the need of companies to enforce MFA while keeping the authentication experience completely within the controlled environment of the employee or customer app. Unique in the IAM industry, SecureAuth Endpoint allows companies to protect machine login with Adaptive MFA. SecureAuth Endpoint for Windows, macOS, and Linux, allows companies to deploy passwordless machine login with risk-based adaptive authentication across their laptops and on-prem or cloud servers. SecureAuth Endpoint provides MFA protection for online and offline devices, i.e., when the device is in airplane mode.
Being a global player, how different or similar do you find Middle Eastern markets?
Digital identities are advanced in the region. The UAE has uniquely pushed the concept of digital identities to manage municipal requests. We understand the modernity of the Middle Eastern market and the fantastic requirements implemented around digital identities and passwordless. There are many similarities across all markets, and they have their unique requirements. SecureAuth understands the needs of the Middle East market and our biometric-based passwordless solutions adapt to their requirements.
What kind of response have SecureAuth experienced in the Middle East and what is driving growth for you?
We are experiencing increased interest from end user customers and from channel partners excited to experience the innovative solutions we deliver to the market. Recently, we have seen the focus on security increase globally and with our unique capabilities, the Middle East market is a key area of focus.
Which products from your product portfolio contribute maximum to your regional business?
Our SecureAuth Identity Platform, which includes multi-factor authentication, Single Sign-on, adaptive authentication, intelligent risk engine, user life cycle management, SecureAuth Identity Store and passwordless addresses the challenges of navigating privacy and security as we shift to a flexible work model as organizations digitally transform. Organizations must transition to passwordless, and our Middle Eastern and African customers understand it better than most markets. It is the divorce from username and passwords to passwordless that delivers a frictionless user experience. Our new Mobile SDK, an invisible 2FA for branded apps and MFA for the endpoint that provides unified passwordless authentication, are new features that will also be quickly adopted as we have seen demand from customers.
How important is channel for you and what is your distribution strategy?
Channel partners are the most important element in our go-to-market strategy, and SecureAuth is 100 percent channel-driven. Our partners are critical in providing the local knowledge and expert perspective to ensure customer success. Middle Eastern distribution plays a significant role in helping us address all the needs of individual countries and becomes an extension of our own team to deliver customer productivity and growth. We recently announced our agreement with Cyberlinx, a well-known cybersecurity professional services provider, demonstrating how important channel partners are to our go-to-market strategy.
Which are your key markets in the region and what are your plans to increase your footprint in the Middle East & Africa?
We have experienced interest from all markets in the Middle East and Africa. We will increase our footprint in these regions with our partner-first strategy. We are optimistic about the success this will bring, especially in finance, healthcare, utility and other highly regulated industries.
Please share the key elements of your channel program and what are the major advantages that program offers to your partners?
SecureAuth Partner Program enables resellers, distributors, and solution providers in the US, EMEA, Asia Pacific and the Middle East and Africa through its reinforced focus on channel partners to increase customer satisfaction, revenue growth, and profitability across the company’s network of partners. The Program is designed to bolster reseller partners through marketing, selling and support our identity security solutions. Partners are rewarded with increased resources and benefit as their commitment grows.
Our Program is composed of three enrollment tiers, each offering a rich set of benefits. We offer a bullish channel program including enablement for sales and technical, spiff programs, and tiered discount margins. SecureAuth experts deliver technical training to support partner success. Resellers can promote their services and make margins. We support the channel partner’s expertise in additional security offerings for governance and privileged access.
How do you ensure channel partners work with you despite increasing competition?
We have a robust Partner Program. SecureAuth offers channel partners competitive deal registration margins, renewal margins, and incumbency protection. Our solutions for on-premise, hybrid and cloud deployments are flexible, agile and easy to work with. Our innovation is laser focused on identity security with the introduction of the SecureAuth Identity Store, a privacy-focused SaaS directory, directly addresses the existing identity management issues with service providers and customer identities.
SecureAuth thrives in complex environments, and with our newest release of the SecureAuth Identity Store, and enhancements SecureAuth platform and future roadmap. The relationships we have been fortunate to develop over the years with the channel partners in the geographies we service have gotten us to where our partners recommend us over other vendors in the industry.
What message would you like to give to channel partners, both existing and prospective?
Our focus is to give channel partners the ability to deliver agile and adaptable identity security. Partners can easily make margin and enable them to leverage their specific services and complementary solutions in their portfolio for end-to-end identity and access management deployment.
The relationships we have been fortunate to develop over the years with the channel partners in the geographies we service has led to our partners recommending SecureAuth over other vendors in the industry. We are easy to do business with.
We are innovating extremely well, moving into adaptive authentication, and delivering a super robust risk model, so the platform is available now.
Partners can integrate with the SecureAuth Platform to serve the custom requirements of the highly regulated industries with additional solutions in the Middle East and Africa. Our identity security experts understand what it takes to run a business 24×7 securely. SecureAuth is dedicated to the channel, and our reps are highly motivated to work with channel partners. We are committed to our model, partnerships, and making SecureAuth as a vendor in a growth market. We look forward to expanding our relationships as we move into larger markets worldwide.
