Interviews

We assure bottom-line for our partners

Kaspersky Labs
Altaf Halde
Managing Director South Asia, Kaspersky Labs
Anti-virus and internet security software provider Kaspersky Labs believes India to be one of its key destinations in the A-PAC region. Traditionally focussed on the small and medium enterprises, the company now wants to seek new avenues amidst the large industries. Altaf Halde, Managing Director for South Asia speaks to Channel Times on the company’s plans and how Channel Partners continue to play a crucial role in their success. Excerpts from the chat:

What is the roadmap for Kaspersky’s enterprise business for the next calendar year?

India is one of Kaspersky Lab’s key markets in Asia-Pacific and growing extremely fast, particularly in the B2B space. Traditionally, we have been strong in the small and medium business (SMB) segment and various surveys point that we are among top three players in endpoint security in India. We are trusted globally in security as is reaffirmed with our technology alliances and OEM agreements with companies including Microsoft, IBM, Cisco, Juniper Networks, Blue Coat, Check Point, D-Link, GFI, Netgear, SonicWALL RSA, ZyXel, etc.

In India, to focus on the larger enterprises, we have appointed Comguard as our national distributor. As we move into the next orbit of growth, it is extremely important for us to align with the right set of partners and our association with ComGuard is a step in that direction. In addition to the efforts of our existing national distributor’s E-caps and Sea Infonet, we are confident that we will be able to spread our reach across accounts as well as geographies.

Is Kaspersky’s focus only on SMB or also on the other segments also?

Traditionally, we have been strong in the SMB segment and various surveys point that we are among the top three players in endpoint security globally. While consolidating our SMB footprint in India, we would also like to reach out to larger enterprises, clients having 1000-plus nodes. Our enterprise readiness stems from the fact that we now have an excellent Endpoint product – Kaspersky Endpoint Security for Business (KESB), which has taken us up a few notches higher in the Leader’s quadrant besides IDC and Forrester also naming us the top three global leaders in the endpoint market.

A section of the market believes Kaspersky is branded as a customer-centric product. How far do you think that there is awareness of its enterprise-level product capabilities?

Two years ago, your query may have been true that Kaspersky’s recall as a consumer IT security brand was stronger. But, now the recall of Kaspersky as a B2B brand has increased. Today we are among the top three global leaders in endpoint security. And our credibility in enterprises is firmly established. Recently we conducted an internal survey to gauge the market awareness and usage of our enterprises solutions. It did not come as a surprise to us that we are among the top three most recalled brand of enterprise security solutions for SMBs, and many large enterprises are evaluating our B2B solutions. Due to our strong channel network and focused marketing and PR efforts, our enterprise solutions are now positioned as firmly as our consumer solution.

There are reports that some loyal channel partners of yours – in the East and South – are installing the home segment anti-virus at SMB premises. What steps are you taking to prevent this?

Our enterprise solutions cater to customers having ten users and above. We have already started on a project to educate our channel partners through regular communication programs and we believe that they will cascade the knowledge to their customers.

Please explain briefly about the Pitstop series? What are the regions you are planning to organize in the coming days?

As you would know, Pitstops are places to refuel and energize. Our Partner Pitstop series, which we initiated some time last year has been successful in keeping up constant and continuous contact with partners, understand the market and customer’s expectations better. We have done Pitstops in all the four regions and we will again revisit the same cities with a few more additional tier-2 cities in our Pitstops for this year.

You’ve tied up with online ticketing sites suggesting that the industry that has confidential business transactions are coming on board. Will you encourage your channel partners to focus on this particular industry segment, especially banking and financial institutions?

We already have some very good customers in BFSI and we will continue to focus on BFSI through our channels. In some of the recent activities that we have conducted, be it a webinar or event, we have seen several ÍT executives from leading BFSI companies evincing interest to know more about our enterprise offerings. We see this as a definite positive sign for the future.

Generally what are the aspects Kaspersky considers while drafting a scheme for partners?

It really depends on what type of offer is being created. But one common thread that runs through all such promotion is that we would like the partner to feel valued for their efforts. So, whether it is providing our partners with lifetime opportunities of meeting our brand ambassador Sachin Tendulkar or watching the Indian Grand Prix from the Grand Stand or cash incentives or holidays abroad, we make sure that efforts and performance are recognized. But above all, we ensure the bottom line that partners get for selling and supporting Kaspersky is the main incentive for them to sell our solutions.

Please explain your certification policy and type of certificates

It is mandatory for our distributors’ engineers to be certified in Kaspersky Lab products and solutions. As per the Green Team Partner program, our platinum and gold partners are also required to hold certifications from Kaspersky Lab. Our job is to ensure compliance. These certifications are not only technical related but also cover sales certifications.

In today’s scenario, all the vendors keep focusing on not just the CEO (SI), but also the manager of respective products by providing them special incentives. What’s your view?

Yes, we agree and have seen the value in undertaking such initiatives in the past. Currently, we are running such an offer for our partners’ techno-commercial team along with one of our distributor and results, so far, are positive.

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