Borderware, a Mississauga, Ont.-based security software developer, was starting to become boring admitted Bill Simpson, the company’s vice president of marketing and product development. The cure came in the form of hardware security appliances Borderware released.
Called Mxtreme, the new hardware
products are a range of mail firewall appliances based on Borderware’s firewall server and mail gateway products.
“”Mxtreme is new for Borderware as it is an appliance. We only did software before, but we saw the market demand and it was reinforced by our channel and we built it over the summer,”” Simpson said.
With the new products comes a new channel strategy and approach.
“”The big difference is between software and hardware. We had licenses and it was a different requirement on the reseller. Now they are getting a plug and play solution,”” he said.
There will also be more incentives for Bordorware resellers such as discount plan to buy a system for demo purposes.
Also part of the plan is an attractive box, Simpson said.
“”It is a trivial point but they respond to them and it make its easier for the reseller to sell,”” he added.
Simpson expects to double his channel by next year. Currently Borderware has a couple of hundred active resellers through distributors such as Interwork Technologies and EMJ Data Systems.
“”What we want to do is look for volume with resellers such as Insight and Software Spectrum,”” he said.
“”We’ve had a strong channel plan with distribution and that has not changed much. We have built on it and we want to expand our channel into different kinds of resellers. The software limited us a little bit to just integration shops. Now appliances are a commodity and should be picked up by volume resellers and catalogues,”” he added.
Borderware’s Mxtreme protects email systems with a layered security model that guards against attacks at all levels, including OS hacks, malformed messages, viruses, and even against employee misuse and SPAM, the firm claims
According to Simpson, firewalls do not provide adequate protection for email, which is the chosen target by hackers. “”It is not just about virus it is more than virus it is the problem of having your internal mail systems connected to every mail server in the world that is were the critical issue is,”” he said.
“”Electronic probing, compromise and theft are commonplace on the Internet today,”” said Jim Hurley, vice president of security and privacy with Aberdeen Group. “”Our latest research shows that simply connecting to mail and Web sites is a dangerous activity unless the tools needed to detect and protect the enterprise are deployed. Borderware’s Mxtreme Mail Firewall is an excellent example of the new kind of protection that organizations need.””
