Symantec to refocus direct sales as part of reorganisation

Security vendor to take a knife to middle management as it aims to empower front-line staff

Symantec has announced a new strategy that will see it streamline its product offering, remove middle management positions and refocus its direct sales force on new business.

The security and storage giant announced last night that it will collapse its products into 10 key integrated solution areas in a process that will take up to 24 months.

Middle managers and executives holding duplicate roles will be in the firing line as Symantec trims its 17,000-strong workforce between now and June.

The cull will result in estimated severance payments of $275m (£174m), Symantec said.

The reorganisation is designed to make things easier for customers and partners, upon whom Symantec said it would continue to rely heavily to manage current customers. However, it will now "refocus" its direct sales staff on new business.

The 10 key solution areas Symantec earmarked are: Mobile Workforce Productivity, Norton Protection, Norton Cloud, Information Security Services, Identity/Content-Aware Security Gateway, Data Center Security, Business Continuity, Integrated Backup, Cloud-Based Information Management and Object Storage Platform.

Symantec chief executive Steve Bennett emphasised that they would not be presented to customers as packages they must take or leave.

He said: "Customers can still decide what is right for them and buy accordingly, but have the added option of migrating to new integrated offerings which provide added flexibility we know they will need to combat constantly evolving threats, particularly via mobile and the cloud."

Symantec said the strategy will accelerate its growth. It is committed to delivering more than five per cent organic revenue growth and non-GAAP operating margins of more than 30 per cent over the next two to three years.

Its fiscal 2014 will be a year of transition in which organic growth hits just zero to two per cent, Symantec added.

For its fiscal third quarter of 2013, which ended on 28 December, Symantec saw revenue rise four per cent to $1.79bn. Non-GAAP operating margin stood at 26.5 per cent.

Symantec has also created a new Office of the CEO, which will see a small team of executives make collective decisions with Bennett on a daily basis.

Front-line employees will be given "greater empowerment" in a bid to make Symantec more flexible, the vendor added.

Bennett said: "This is a story about more focus and better execution by Symantec to make things better and easier for our customers and partners. Our path is straightforward: offer better products and services tailor made for customers, and make it easier for them to research, shop, buy, use, and get the help and support they need."