Even security can be virtualized

What is your opinion about the impact of slowdown on Indian business?



I think that 65% of the slowdown in India is hyped and we will find ways to

make our economy stronger if we stop discussing it. The slowdown has more to do

with liquidity crunch. Last year, while we were growing at 60%, people were

talking about registering single digit growth. Fortinet had a record in its

history, in the last quarter, and in India we registered 30% growth for the same

period. Right now, services and ITeS verticals have taken a hit, but it gives

new opportunities for companies like us because security is bound to grow.

Vishak Raman, regional director, India and SAARC Fortinet

What kind of support will you extend to your customers?



We are aware that our partners are going through a credit crisis right now.

So Fortinet needs to extend credit support to our partners through our

distributors. If a customer does not pay the channel, then vendors and

distributors need to stand behind the channel. We should extend our support by

deactivating the service to him and stop our anti-virus and security feeds. The

distributors too need to co-operate.

What else are you doing to help your partners?



We are insisting on enforcing strict channel discipline. For instance, there

need to be case locking by channel partners, which will be non-negotiable. But

there has to be a qualification standard for the same so that this service is

used effectively. Those policies have to be made crystal clear. We tend to

dilute these policies during good times. This is the time when vendors need to

be more strict about it.

Fortinet has always been referred to as a unified threat management (UTM)

company. Will this continue to be a thrust area for you this year?



Yes, Fortinet has been known for its UTM solutions, but we are a lot more

than just that. We are a complete security solution provider for enterprise and

SMB customers. This year, since companies are looking at consolidation of their

IT infrastructure and lowering costs, we will become aggressive about our

concept of virtualization in security.

Already, we have deployed some projects on this technology in some verticals

like airlines and banks. After succeeding in this, we are gearing our partners

towards offering this technology to their entire set of existing clients. So

far, people think that virtualization is limited to networking, desktops and

servers. When we tell them that even security can be virtualized, our partners

and customers alike find it very hard to believe. Now that we have a couple of

successful projects around virtualized security under our belt, we are ready to

go out in the market and evangelize this concept.

Vinita Bhatia/DQ Channels



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