Clearswift: If you're not our partner, you're missing out

Vendor says it is comfortably outgrowing the wider web and email gateway security market

Clearswift claims partners of rival gateway security vendors will be green with envy after growing bookings for its core products by nearly a quarter in its last financial year.

The UK-based outfit, which was acquired by private equity house Lyceum Capital in November, is also expecting to make an acquisition before the end of the calendar year.

For its fiscal year to 31 March, Clearswift posted its fourth consecutive year of profit and saw bookings of its core web and email gateway product rise by 24 per cent.

Some 85 per cent of its revenue was recurring, up from about 50 per cent four years ago, with about 75 per cent of sales coming from mid- to large-sized firms with at least 1,000 seats.

Last year, Clearswift moved to a one-tier channel model as it axed sole distributor Arrow ECS. In February it cut its UK channel account management roles in favour of upping investment in technical and telephone-based resource for its resellers.

Talking to ChannelWeb, chief executive Richard Turner (pictured) said the results showed Clearswift's strategy had paid off and that it is outpacing its competitors.

"Lots of people would be envious of seeing our core gateway products grow at 24 per cent, which is comfortably ahead of the market," he said.

Although there are no plans to actively add to Clearswift's base of 50 to 60 UK resellers, Turner suggested those working with rival web and email security products may be "missing an opportunity".

"A lot of the other vendors are trying to expand their coverage," he said. "I'm sure that is in their interests but I am not sure it is in the interests of the channel. This year has been a year of consolidation around our channel. We are no less a channel company today than we were last year or the year before."

Turner stressed that Clearswift's offering is not a managed service and said he had talked to many resellers who are rethinking their relationships with cloud vendors.

"Many leapt onto the cloud bandwagon two years ago and now have concerns that all they are doing is introducing the vendor to the customer, without adding any value," he said.

"[Our gateways] are typically installed on the customer's premises on a virtual appliance, which means the reseller can get involved in deployment and bespoke services."

For its financial year, Clearswift's total billings grew by about 10 per cent. Inorganic growth is also now an option following the Lyceum takeover, Turner confirmed.

"We had no aspirations to acquire under the last group of shareholders," he said. "In the past three months we have started to build a strategic plan for non-organic growth and I would hope to get at least one acquisition done by the end of this year."