Cato Networks Unveils MSASE Partner Platform

Cato Networks’ Frank Rauch said with MSASE, his company wanted to simplify consumption and delivery of managed SASE.

“What we wanted to do is allow the partners to differentiate themselves, basically make it seamless, really easy for them, increase their speed to market, reduce their sales cycle, and then take advantage of what is really resonating in the market, being a capex-free solution,” he said. “So when you look at managed services, basically you have your operating cost and you have your people cost. And if you have firewalls or if you have physical devices, you have depreciation on those devices. We don't have any capex. Ours is an opex-only model.”

Over the next two years, managed SASE service adoption will rise significantly across enterprises. According to Gartner, “by 2026, at least 45% of enterprises will use managed SASE services, an increase of three times from early 2023.”

MSASE gives partners a true multitenant environment, Rauch said. It allows partners to manage multiple customers via the same screen and same system “in an easy way.”

“There’s also the co-branding capability,” he said. "So basically the partner has the ability to flip a switch on a screen that shows their brand powered by Cato, and shows the Cato brand, etc. We've also invested tremendously in APIs. A good example would be CommandLink. They're very differentiated based on their API stack, So us having a very good API catalog makes it easy to integrate their value to our value. I think the first-line and second-line support tools differentiate and make it easy for partners. We do knowledge share and we have knowledge share forums. We have playbooks that are already designed that take them through exactly how to acquire customers, how to retain customers and how to grow customers. We have quoting tools in the platform so they don't have to figure it out. We have rapid deployment tools, license visibility, and again, no opex.”

MSASE should give both Cato Networks and its partners a competitive advantage, Rauch said.

“We think so just simply because the market's ready for SASE,” he said. “There' are about 150,000 MSPs out there right now. And there are over 4 million security jobs open worldwide, so they can't find the people. They can't find a seamless solution. We offer it in a managed service, and we offer this seamless solution and a true SASE that was integrated from the start and that’s cloud-native. It’s not dependent on any of the CSPs to be able to have points of presence (POPS), so we have low latency. It's just the solution that people are looking for. And this solution scales across the market and across use cases. So we're getting a lot of interaction from manufacturing, retail and other use cases. We're also seeing this resonate in midmarket and the enterprise.”

Cato Networks says it’s the fastest-growing network security startup, with a 59% year-over-year increase in revenue last year.

“We're seeing well above 50% of our business coming from deal registration, meaning that it's not just going through the channel; it's not just channel fulfilled, it's channel created,” Rauch said. “So the partners are going out there and they're learning how to hunt. And these partners can be telcos. They can be other types of service providers, aggregators, agents or resellers. So it's a broad channel. And I think the partners are saying, at least from the feedback I'm getting, that they don't want to get to a race to the bottom. They don't want to be in with some of the bigger security companies. They want to be in with something different. This resonates; it's different. We're very selective about who we do business with. And I can guarantee you that our deal registration stands up. It's literally the most predictable deal registration I've seen."

In terms of Cato Networks’ overall strategy, the company keeps a close eye on the evolving threat landscape and adjusts accordingly, Rauch said.

“We have antennas everywhere so we're monitoring the latest threats,” he said. “We just formed a new security group headed by a Boston College professor who works for Cato and is really well respected in the industry. So he's got his team analyzing the constant threats. We're also using AI in some of our products, etc. We're getting that real-time pulse of what's going on out there and how to prevent it.”

In the months ahead, Cato Networks partners can expect what Rauch calls “rolling thunder,” including partner conferences, analyst season and partner program enhancements. The updated partner program should be ready for launch within six to seven months.

“We're not going to throw out the old program, but there are definitely ways to enhance the program, because when you look at the program right now, it's not necessarily a one-size-fits-all. People are making money off of it and they are happy with it,” he said. “It's profitable. Partners seem to be very satisfied. But we want to be able to customize the program more toward the specific routes to market, to be able to cater to the MSPs, MSSPs, the integrator, the GSI type of channel and the agent type of channel. So I think you're going to see more legs on the program that reach out to the different routes to market."

And the final thing I would say is we're going to continue to innovate," Rauch said. "We feel like we have a competitive advantage right now, but we’re a highly publicized, well talked about company, so we need to continue to raise that bar.”

In the months ahead, Cato Networks partners can expect what Rauch calls “rolling thunder,” including partner conferences, analyst season and partner program enhancements. The updated partner program should be ready for launch within six to seven months.

“We're not going to throw out the old program, but there are definitely ways to enhance the program, because when you look at the program right now, it's not necessarily a one-size-fits-all. People are making money off of it and they are happy with it,” he said. “It's profitable. Partners seem to be very satisfied. But we want to be able to customize the program more toward the specific routes to market, to be able to cater to the MSPs, MSSPs, the integrator, the GSI type of channel and the agent type of channel. So I think you're going to see more legs on the program that reach out to the different routes to market."

And the final thing I would say is we're going to continue to innovate," Rauch said. "We feel like we have a competitive advantage right now, but we’re a highly publicized, well talked about company, so we need to continue to raise that bar.”