Gartner’s latest managed security services provider (MSSP) report is missing the names of four big IT giants who made it last year but have disappeared.
DXC Technology, BT, Orange Business Services and HCL Technologies appeared to have softly and suddenly vanished away and will not be met with again.
Instead Gartner praised new addition Alert Logic’s comprehensive pricing tiers, extensive support for Amazon Web Services (AWS) and Microsoft Azure customers, and higher-than-average customer reference scores.
The other names were all there SecureWorks, Trustwave, Symantec, Verizon, IBM, AT&T, CenturyLink, BAE Systems, Atos, Capgemini, Wipro, NTT and Fujitsu.
“We review and adjust our inclusion criteria for Magic Quadrants as markets change”, the report stated.
“A vendor’s appearance in a Magic Quadrant one year and not the next does not necessarily indicate that we have changed our opinion of that vendor. It may be a reflection of a change in the market and, therefore, changed evaluation criteria, or of a change of focus by that vendor.”
Orange has bolstered its cybersecurity presence over recent months, with the acquisitions of SecureData and SecureLink.
This year’s quadrant sees both Alert Logic and CenturyLink being placed in the “Visionaries” section of the quadrant – which was notably empty in last year’s version.
Secure Works, Trustwave, IBM, Symantec and Verizon were all ranked as “Leaders” with the remaining MSSPs filling the “Niche Players” section.
The analyst said the MSS market was “mature”, estimating its market size at $10.7 billion.
It added that the MSSP market for being quick to adapt to the challenges facing organisations, such as increasingly complex IT environments that include infrastructure-as-a-service (IaaS), software-as-a-service (SaaS), the growing hostile external landscape, the continuing skills shortage in security and the needs of “less mature organisations” with basic security functions.
“As our clients pursue cloud-oriented and cloud-first approaches, the scope of security monitoring service requirements is also expanding”, the report said.
