Sophos partners have cautiously welcomed its Secureworks acquisition, despite one saying it puts it in an “interesting complement/compete situation”.
The Thoma Bravo-backed cybersecurity vendor yesterday announced a definitive agreement to buy SecureWorks, a $370m-revenue XDR specialist listed on the NASDAQ but 83% owned by Dell.
James Holton, Cyber Security Practice Director at Sophos Platinum partner Trustmarque, said the deal will “significantly build” on Sophos’ recent growth in the services space.
“Whilst it doesn’t change anything, it does put them in an interesting complement/compete situation with traditional VARs and MSSPs and continues the trend of a new form of ISV who have heavy service wraps around the technology,” he told IT Channel Oxygen.
“We work closely with Sophos to make sure we have services capabilities that complement not compete with them, so I’m buoyant about this acquisition.”
Gavin Jones, CEO of Sophos Platinum partner Planet IT, gave Sophos credit for how it has to date confounded concerns around potential partner conflict over its services strategy.
“When Sophos introduced MDR, that felt like they were treading on resellers’ territory in terms of doing services,” he said.
“But it’s never done anything that hasn’t benefitted partners in terms of being able to sell and support it, and create sticky revenue for us, so we’re quite excited by [this acquisition].”
Taegis traction
Secureworks last September rolled its partner-first approach for its flagship Taegis XDR platform to the UK and Europe, where its top partners include Bytes and Saepio.
In its most recent quarter, Taegis revenue grew 7% year on year to $71.2m. Secureworks’ total revenue fell 8% to $82.2m.
Sophos said it expects to integrate solutions from both companies into a “broader and stronger security portfolio benefiting SME customers”.
The addition of SecureWorks will “add more depth” to Sophos’ offering, Planet IT’s Jones said.
“Our impression is that it’s going to be incorporated into the MDR product, so it’s not going to be a separate product to sell,” he said.
“If that’s the route they take, that will bolster their MDR revenues, which we’re already seeing is a huge growth area for our business. So we’re quite excited by it.”
Set to close in early 2025, the all-cash transaction values SecureWorks at around $859m.
In a statement, Sophos CEO Joe Levy said: “Secureworks offers an innovative, market-leading solution with their Taegis XDR platform. Combined with our security solutions and industry leadership in MDR, we will strengthen our collective position in the market and provide better outcomes for organisations of all sizes globally.”
Doug Woodburn is editor of IT Channel Oxygen
