Six months ago one would not have seen Singtel as a serious player in managed security services. In April this year it announced its intention to acquire Trustwave for $810 million, yesterday that deal was finally completed for $770 million.
The acquisition will add an additional six security operations centres to Singtel’s lone centre in Singapore, although a second has been planned in Australia. With the Trustwave SOC in Manilla, Philippines this will deliver a strong presence in the region where Singtel should be able to bring a lot of customers to the US based company. The weak point is clearly Europe and it will be interesting to see what Trustwave plans are for that region as they seek to strengthen their global presence.
In 2014 Singtel did not make it onto the Gartner quadrant for MSSP’s. This acquisition will make it interesting to see if Trustwave can push into the leaders quadrant in the next iteration.
Although Trustwave will continue to run as a separate entity Singtel would be advised to consolidate its MSSP services into a single structure. This may mean the movement of employees from Singtel to Trustwave, but there was no clarification around this.
Mr Bill Chang, Chief Executive Officer, Singtel Group Enterprise, in a canned statement said: “Singtel will leverage Trustwave’s strong market position in North America and its deep capabilities to offer differentiated security solutions to our customers.
With Trustwave as the core of our cyber security business, Singtel is well positioned to be a leading global Managed Security Services provider.
This acquisition enables us to meet the increasing demand of enterprises worldwide for a trusted partner to secure their networks, mobility platforms, devices, IT, applications and databases.”
Trustwave strengthens Singtel
Singtel also gains access to several other capabilities to strengthen its security services, these include
- Enterprise-grade managed security services for threat, vulnerability and compliance management delivered through the unified, cloud-based TrustKeeper® portal
- More than three million business subscribers (including 10,000 managed security services enterprise customers) in 96 countries
- More than 1,200 security-focused employees located in 26 different countries
- World-renowned Trustwave SpiderLabs® ethical hacking and threat research team
With the managed security market set to grow from US$15 billion in 2015 to US$27 billion by 2019 according to Gartner there is little doubt about the reasons behind this acquisition. From the Trustwave point of view it will give the company access especially to the Asian market and propel their growth further.
Mr Robert J. McCullen, Trustwave Chief Executive Officer and President, commented: “Joining Singtel gives us the ability to leverage its global presence and resources to accelerate worldwide adoption of Trustwave managed security services and technologies.
“By combining Singtel’s robust information and communications technology solutions with Trustwave’s industry-leading security offerings, we can provide cutting-edge services that enhance what we deliver to our valued customers and partners. With the backing of Singtel, we will continue to innovate, deliver and expand our global leadership in cyber security services and technologies.”
The additional staff and locations will enable the new entity to easily deliver follow the sun support and will also provide a better access/early warning to some of the cyberthreats that emanate from Asia.
