Indian SMBs to invest $134mn on security in 2006

NEW DELHI: Small and medium businesses (SMBs) in India

are on track to cross $133.6 million on beefing up their IT security solutions

this year, buoyed by their adoption of sophisticated enterprise applications and

advanced storage solutions.






This translated into a jump of 53 per cent over last year, according to the
latest study by New York-based Access Markets International (AMI) Partners.






As Indian SMBs (with employee sizes between 1 and 999) embrace the benefits of
Internet access, network connectivity and increased storage capacity, IT

security has become an important focal point for these businesses.






"Many SMBs have seen the loss in productivity and have experienced the
damage that online viruses can inflict," said Kolkata-based analyst at AMI

Neha Jalan.






"With the explosive growth of the Internet, the advent of broadband
'always-on' technology, and the increased prevalence of viruses and malicious

worms, data security has assumed greater significance," she added.






According to AMI, one of the primary factors hindering the widespread use of
security solutions has been a lack of awareness among Indian SMBs.

"However, the upsurge in security solutions adoption is the result of

pressure from both internal and external factors," said Jalan. "These

include deployment of broadband connectivity, integration of various business

applications, usage of hosted applications and increased interaction with global

business partners," she stated.






More than a third of small businesses (SBs) (1-99 employees) and 42 per cent of
medium businesses (MBs) (100-999 employees) rated the need to enhance enterprise

IT security as "important" and "very important."






AMI's latest studies on India's small and medium businesses show that 83 per
cent of SMBs have installed anti-virus software on their PCs and 30 per cent of

MBs also deploy anti-spam software. Additionally, the majority of LAN small and

medium businesses have deployed a software-based firewall on their PCs or LAN

servers.






Given their limited budgets and in-house IT skills and resources, SMBs need
products that are easy to adopt and maintain. Until now, India SMBs have been

focused on deploying stand-alone security solutions.






However, as vendors offer point-based solutions to counter different kinds of
attacks, users face the challenge of integrating these various solutions. This

has led to the emergence of integrated security solutions as one of the

fastest-growing segments in the SMB security market.






The study further reveals that less than a tenth of medium businesses currently
invest in managed security services, but this service is anticipated to grow

much faster than other traditional security solutions in the near future.






"India SMBs prefer to manage their security deployment internally, and as
most are still investing in basic security products, this strategy has been

effective. Nevertheless, as businesses progress towards deploying firewalls,

VPNs and IDS, managed security services offer the twin benefits of convenience

and cost-effectiveness," remarked Jalan.