SonicWall experiencing record growth across all segments
Building on momentum from the company’s ‘Generation 7’ cybersecurity platform evolution, SonicWall is experiencing record growth across all segments, including enterprise, small- and medium-sized businesses (SMB) and government.
This growth is being accelerated by organizations’ critical need to protect against ransomware attacks, which are up 116% globally year-to-date through May 2021.
“We have been hard at work to deliver the technology, services and programs our partners and customers need in order to stay ahead of cyber threats — including ransomware — that are outpacing organizations’ traditional security postures,” said SonicWall President and CEO Bill Conner.
“This is evident by the company’s three consecutive quarters of sequential and year-over-year bookings growth. Our momentum demonstrates that the global customer community is recognizing the need for a new cybersecurity paradigm, and it is also accelerating business for our valued SecureFirst partners worldwide.”
Superior portfolio performance
With the shifting changes during and post-pandemic, mid-market organizations, enterprises, service providers and government agencies are seeking new and cost-effective approaches to disrupt the traditional cybersecurity model.
As result, SonicWall mid-range and high-end firewalls continue to see accelerated growth, with the company reporting a 53% quarter-over-quarter increase in bookings for its powerful NSa firewall series and a 380% quarter-over-quarter increase for its high-end NSsp firewall series. The company also posted a 33% increase in bookings of the SonicWall Switch series introduced in June 2020.
Organizations have become top targets for attackers who realize many are often vulnerable due to budget constraints, talent gaps and the growing intensity of cyberattacks. As a result, SonicWall has recorded quarter-over-quarter growth in the number of customers attaching the multi-engine Capture Advanced Threat Protection (ATP) sandbox service to each deployment.
In April, Capture ATP, which includes patented Real-Time Deep Memory Inspection (RTDMI), received a perfect score in the ICSA Labs Advanced Threat Defense test for Q1 2021. During the 35-day test cycle, ICSA conducted a total of 1,471 tests against Capture ATP, with a mixture of 580 new and little-known malicious samples and 891 innocuous applications. Capture ATP correctly identified all malicious samples with no false positives, proving the effectiveness of the solution against unknown threats.
With more than 300 innovative patents granted, including RTDMI, SonicWall’s continued investment in research and development efforts have resulted in Capture ATP discovering 589,313 ‘never-before-seen’ malware variants in 2020.
Continued partner support
Enhancements made to the SecureFirst Managed Security Service Provider (MSSP) Program in the Spring of 2020 propelled the program past its projected participant goals and revenue targets for both the North American and EMEA region.
“We have experienced steady growth in our partner base because of the expansion of our portfolio and the ease of management of our products, specifically in the retail and education sectors,” said SonicWall Vice President, Global Channel Sales, HoJin Kim. “The SonicWall Boundless 2020 virtual event also helped to boost our number of transacting partners as we surpassed company records in attendance.”
Partner enablement
Over 213,000 SonicWall University courses were completed by partners in 2020, and over 1.3 million continuing education points were earned. SonicWall data indicates that partners with Boundless Cybersecurity training sell two times the number of products than partners without. In 2021, SonicWall University has seen the completion of 396,000 hours of training administration of 791,000 successful exams.
SonicWall recently modified its SecureFirst program to make it more inclusive of registered partners. Updates include the acceptance of third-party certifications for silver tier partners and the reduction of a continuing education requirement to allow more flexibility with enablement requirements.