WatchGuard Technologies, a global leader in manageable business security solutions, today announced its Q2 billings overall grew 16 percent year-over-year (YOY) and 18 percent YOY for its core firewall and next generation Unified Threat Management (UTM) products. This is the sixth straight quarter WatchGuard’s core products have achieved double-digit growth, averaging 16 percent year-over-year during that time.
The company attributes gains primarily to its enhanced manageability features designed for enterprises, resulting in increased demand for its XTM Series UTM products, including its XTM 5 Series for mid-sized businesses which grew by 19 percent YOY. WatchGuard also experienced combined growth of 37 percent YOY for its XTM 8 Series, 1050 and 2050 products, which are scaled for organizations with 1,000 or more employees.
This was the sixth straight quarter of more than 30 percent growth in the enterprise category. While WatchGuard has long enjoyed market leadership in the 50-500 employee category, this trend demonstrates that larger customers are realizing the value of WatchGuard’s UTM suite.
Performance, Manageability Reign Supreme
“We’ve been able to double, and in many cases triple, our performance with the recent hardware refresh of our XTM 5 series products,” said Richard Barber, CFO at WatchGuard Technologies. “And while WatchGuard’s clients continue to expect the best in performance, IT professionals look to us for real world security solutions which make it easier for them to manage their network security without the high expense associated with other solutions in the market.”
The exponential rise in global security threats coupled with pressures to comply with industry standards and government regulations have heightened the burden on security professionals to find cost-effective solutions that give them greater control. According to Gartner Research, “More than 95 percent of firewall breaches are caused by firewall misconfigurations, not firewall flaws.”
Recognizing this, WatchGuard has continually innovated and focused its resources on manageability, dedicating more developers to this area than any of its other security solutions. In July, WatchGuard released updates to its XTM Operating System with WatchGuard Fireware XTM 11.6, providing advanced performance and management features that help administrators define, review and enforce network policies while still maintaining ease of use. WatchGuard expects to continue its pattern of growth, attracting new enterprise customers with enhanced manageability and leading performance for its price class.
