In 2005, a growth in the firewall and security market of around five to seven per cent occurred (CAGR). This was healthy and impressive but also included SSL VPN's.
The market for SSL VPN's is still growing but has little effect on the firewall and VPN market as a whole. In fact, some analysts are talking of a levelling out of the growth, as saturation is reached with their use. While firewalls and VPNs have no theoretical limit to their use, an SSL VPN has a limit since they are for a specific purpose only. So currently the SSL VPN market is growing but will not last forever.

What is important though is that the whole SSL VPN market has been started by a customer desire to simplify VPN configuration and management. Everyone wants something that is easier to manage and integrate as well as providing a reasonable level of security.

The level of knowledge and understanding of risk within organisations is improving every year. Any reseller involved with security and SSL VPN's needs to assist in this risk management approach. Although the technology can be easy to deploy quickly, it needs to be done with a good understanding of risk and what the impact is on an organisation.

An SSL VPN is an effective solution but not ultra-high security. For instance, an SSL VPN is not an ideal solution to access business critical information from a web cafe since the risks are so high. However, for many users accessing email, an SSL VPN is an ideal solution.

Additionally, a reseller needs to understand the integration of an SSL VPN into an enterprise management infrastructure, which is used for alerting and specific management solutions. This takes a reseller into a slightly different market and a knowledge-basis is required for such solution delivery.

The future however is not with SSL VPN's - it is with the next generation of VPN's in general. What is needed is a solution which can provide the ease of management and control of a SSL VPN but also the end-point security of an IPSEC one. Additionally it needs to be built on fundamentally stronger technologies which can interoperate with other vendors and systems. This "Easy VPN" solution will mate the two worlds of IPSEC VPN's and SSL VPN's together and provide the best of both worlds.

In the meantime, the SSL VPN market continues to grow but there will always be a place and time for something other than an SSL VPN.