Sophos bullish on education

Stanley Glancy / Mumbai

Sophos, a network-based anti-virus solutions provider based out of UK, is planning to mirror its global marketing strategy in the Indian security space. The company is especially bullish on the Indian education sector, where it has already made deep inroads. Sophos, which boasts of a 50 percent market share in the UK education sector, believes the Indian education sector holds tremendous potential for growth.

The company is betting on its special pricing structure formulated solely for this sector. The company’s strategy is to provide licenses to universities and institutions at a special price and also covers personal computers of both students as well as staff at zero extra cost. Said Alan Draper, international business development manager, Africa and Middle East for Sophos, “By covering all the computers connected to the network we ensure that the threat of an attack is reduced to the lowest possible factor. The strategy has also enabled us to garner quite a few customers in India” The company has sold 5,000 licenses in India till date.

Other than the education sector the company is also bullish on the corporate sector. Sophos has partnered with Navi Mumbai-based Satcom Technologies to increase market share in both the sectors. The partnership already boasts of clients like Manipal Education and Medical Group, D-Link, Himalaya Drug Company and Star TV among others.

One key advantage Sophos has is that it is a single product company. This, according to Draper, enables the company to provide customers with better support as it can focus all its resources in providing better support to existing customers.” Said Draper, “The differentiating factor between anti-virus providers is not in the product’s ability to detect a virus but in the vendor’s ability to respond immediately to a new threat.” Sophos upgrades its offerings on a 24-hour basis by automatically checking its database located in UK for updates. Satcom provides Sophos’ customers in India with both onsite, as well as offsite support.