SEP2 and Netpremacy link arms for Google Cloud security push

“It’s very obvious that Google want to play in the security space – you don’t spend $4bn on an organisation if there’s not clear intent there," Sep2 CEO Paul Starr tells CRN

Leeds-based partners SEP2 and Netpremacy have inked a strategic partnership around Google Cloud Security.

While Check Point, Armis and Vectra partner SEP2 has a laser focus on managed security, Netpremacy is a £47m-revenue Google Cloud specialist with 3,000 customers.

Having seen Google acquire one of its key vendor partners, Siemplify, in January 2022, SEP2 has since broadened its expertise with the vendor giant to encompass its entire security stack, CEO Paul Starr said.

"We were engaging with lots of customers who were talking to us about digital transformation, Google Workspace and GCP [Google Cloud Platform], but it's not necessarily an area we want to play in," Starr (pictured above) explained.

"It's very obvious that Google want to play in the security space - you don't spend $4bn on an organisation if there's not clear intent there. [Netpremacy] were getting in a lot of conversations with customers around [Google's cloud security offering] Chronicle SIEM and Chronicle SOAR.

"So it's something that felt very natural."

The strategic partnership will see each party bring in the other on engagements that lie outside their respective area of expertise, but will not involve any white labelling, Starr stressed.

"We need openness and honesty, that's why we've been very public about this partnership," Starr said, adding that SEP2 takes a similar partner-based approach with other non-core services, including penetration testing.

'230% growth'

Founded in 2016, SEP2 has grown its headcount by 230 per cent over the last two years, Starr said.

"We're now 60-plus people, and that's two-to-one in terms of technical headcount versus the rest of the company," he said.

"We've done a lot of work around our apprenticeship scheme, and there are a lot of synergies with how Netpremacy approach the growth of their business. It just felt like a natural fit."