By Pankaj Maru.
It’s been more than a year since Dell acquired security firm SonicWall for an undisclosed amount. However, the acquisition remains one of the interesting buyouts in technology sector in recent years. The deal has been a ‘win-win’ for both Dell and SonicWall.
For the tech giant Dell, the acquisition paved a way to enter the security domain and on the other side, it provided SonicWall with a strong technology and business support to strengthen its presence and compete against other security vendors in the enterprise and small and medium businesses (SMB) space.
In fact, for large tech companies to have a security portfolio has always been a part of their strategy to remain in the business, whether it was Symantec buying Norton in 1990, Intel buying McAfee in 2010 or IBM buying Israeli firm Trusteer recently. Buying security firms is considered a good investment from technology stand point and so has been in the case of Dell and SonicWall.
Post the acquisition, Dell has made some key changes to push SonicWall’s business globally including India. In fact, Dell appointed Amit Singh to lead the Dell SonicWall subsidiary’s business and operations in India.
“We have ramped up our sales and have brought in certain changes internally to focus on SMBs and enterprises. We carved out four regions within India and have segregated SMB and enterprise business. To increase the foot print in the enterprise market, we have built a dedicated team and still our business is 100% indirect,” Amit Singh, Country Manager, Dell SonicWall told Express Computer during a recent interview.
Interestingly, prior to SonicWall becoming a Dell subsidiary, it was largely perceived as a security appliance company with focus on SMB segment. But gradually, now that perceived image of a SMB class company is fading out mainly because of the Dell brand and it has been a biggest advantage for SonicWall.
“Earlier, SonicWall was seen as a SMB class company but now we are able to portray the image of enterprise product company. From Dell’s perspective, company was on a journey to become a end-to-end technology provider and with the security portfolio coming in, we are a end-to-end solutions provider,” Singh said.
Globally, that’s how the technology industry has viewed the Dell SonicWall deal. Beside the huge mutual business benefits the deal brings, it also means a lot to SonicWall customers and channel partners.
“Customers are very anxious to see our products and solutions with Dell brand name as it is valued highly. The channel partners are now directly connected with Dell, the deal has brought more opportunities for them specific to security domain as well as others,” Singh explained.
According to Singh, the trends of BYOD and mobility are getting popular among enterprises in India and other parts of the world, but security still remains the prime concern for enterprises. Globally, though enterprises are moving their software applications into the cloud, Singh pointed that there are few takers of cloud based solutions in India and on-premise still remains in high demand.
About the overall security market, Singh said that the industry is growing in double digit. However, for Dell SonicWall, the performance will be above the the market growth, he concluded.
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