Cisco, Juniper, Palo Alto Networks Shine in Data Center Security Survey

The overwhelming majority of medium and large businesses in North American that operate their own data centers believe virtualization will be an important factor to consider when buying new security services.

That’s one highlight of a new survey from Infonetics Research, which polled 137 such businesses for a new report on data-center security strategies.

“The somewhat isolated market for virtual appliances and virtualization-aware security solutions is merging with software-defined networking (SDN) in the data center, and this combination will lead to explosive market growth,” said Jeff Wilson, research director for cybersecurity technology at Infonetics.

Channel partners have a great opportunity to take advantage of that growth. Businesses polled spent an average of nearly $10 million on data-center security services in 2014, with plans to increase that number by a whopping 57 percent by next year.

So whom do these businesses consider when they go to buy security? Cisco, for one. The equipment giant’s leadership scores were high across the board; in fact, Cisco’s lowest number was higher than any other vendor’s highest score. Enterprises participating in the study ranked Juniper Networks high for technology innovation and price. Palo Alto Networks surprised Infonetics with a high score for management relative to its overall brand awareness and strength.

“The battle for data-center security domination is raging, particularly at the high end of the appliance market,” Wilson added. “2014 brought major market-share changes, and this will continue in 2015 as buyers jump ship to get the throughput, interfaces, connection performance, and detection and mitigation technologies they need.”

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