Military encryption specialist marches into channel

If you care about protecting your customers' data, go with us, ViaSat UK claims

Military and government-focused encryption vendor ViaSat UK is on the hunt for resellers as it takes its first punt at the mainstream corporate market.

ViaSat UK's Eclypt family of solutions is designed to ensure that information on laptops, desktops and servers that have been lost, stolen or attacked cannot be accessed by cybercriminals.

Chris McIntosh, chief executive of ViaSat UK, said the proliferation of sophisticated attacks over the past two years has made the vendor's wares as relevant to corporate customers as its core base of military and government clients.

"Until now, only high-end government and military have been bothered that if their systems were lost or attacked there would be a sophisticated attack against them," he said. "That has all changed, which is why we are opening up to channel and enterprise.

"You now have criminal organisations that are offering to shut down BP's network, or get information on Vodafone's strategic plans, for a price. This means that the defences used by people who were not vulnerable in the past to this high level of attack are totally inappropriate all of a sudden."

ViaSat UK, which was renamed from Stonewood when US vendor ViaSat bought it in 2010, is hunting for a lead partner in each of its key target vertical markets, which include critical utilities, legal, healthcare and banking.

It had previously sold direct to the government and military sectors, and through catalogues with resellers such as Centerprise.

Partners will be supported with training and help with marketing.

McIntosh claimed that ViaSat, whose systems cover data at rest, through to data in transit and mass storage, offers a higher level of encryption than any of its competitors, including fellow public sector specialist Becrypt.

"If you want to tick a box, go with someone like Becrypt. But if you care about your data and the consequences of losing it, you look to someone like us," he said.

"We are the only company that will protect UK top-secret data at rest for the military and government."

However, Keith Ricketts, vice president of marketing at Becrypt, did not recognise McIntosh's view of the world.

"Having the same accreditations and a lower price point than ViaSat, as well offering the flexibility of a software solution, Becrypt continues to be very successful in the MOD and central government markets," he said. "This has given us the confidence to extend our software offering into new form factors like tablets, as a result, we are seeing less and less competition from ViaSat."