'There's a big market out there' - CWSI CEO on expanding in the UK through £1m investment
Investment will create 25 new jobs and will be followed with further funds for acquisitions, CEO tells CRN
Irish MSSP CWSI is investing £1m of its own funds into expanding in the UK, which will include the creation of 25 new jobs and the launch of a new apprenticeship programme.
CWSI, which specialises in mobile and cloud security, acquired UK-based cyber and cloud security services provider AVR in May, a move which saw the Irish firm close its London office and move its people to AVR's Berkshire base.
And CEO Ronan Murphy is now eyeing further growth in the UK, telling CRN that the £1m investment will be backed up by additional funds for acquisitions.
"We're always looking for like-minded businesses, or businesses that operate in a similar area to us," he said.
"We want to keep it as narrow and focused as we can. Lots of people are in cloud security but there's very few that are in mobile security so finding companies that have both skill sets is difficult.
"So if we found a mobile security specialist that had likeminded management and was a fit for us, that would be an obvious target. There's a few of them in the UK that we're talking to.
"There's a big, big market out there not only to go direct to customers, but also to work on a partner-to-partner basis. So one of the things we've done in this business is we've always been very open to partnering because you can't be good at everything."
Most of the 25 new roles that are being created will be within CWSI's service delivery and technical consulting teams, and the new hires will also include apprentices as part of a new apprenticeship programme launching in 2022 to encourage more young people into a career in IT and security.
The company, which expects to have revenues of over £10m this year, claims it is the first Irish MSSP to join the Microsoft Intelligent Security Association, and has also announced a new partnership with SentinelOne to expand its endpoint detection and response offering.
"The security business, it's really, really a challenge getting and finding people out there with the experience. So what better way than to build your own apprentice programme and leverage the knowledge of the team we have here already?" Murphy added.
"A lot of these young folks coming in may choose not to go the university route or to go and get a technical engineering degree. But we don't want to exclude those people anymore because what we see in practice in our business is that some of the most talented people we have may have never done a primary degree, and just have a passion and an aptitude for security."