Exclusive: Securonix SVP APJ on making investments in Australia and becoming 100 percent channel

Ajay Biyani tells CRN Australia his grand plans for the region.

Cybersecurity platform Securonix has been on a growth journey over the past four years, and a year ago, it officially launched in the Australian market.

This journey has seen the cyber platform launch in India, Singapore and now Australia, all led by APJ SVP, Ajay Biyani.

Before opening their doors in Australia, Biyani wanted to make sure that Securonix had the proper investments, that meant delaying its launch in the country for a year.

Biyani spoke exclusively to CRN Australia about why this is the perfect time to launch down under.

"It took a year extra because we wanted to secure and get all the resourcing in place before we commit and go full throttle into the Australian and New Zealand market.

“To me, it is a matter of going out there, helping our partners and end customers,” he said.

One of the major reasons they have targeted this market is their partners and end-users are having three main issues with skills, spending and scale.

"Too many cyber products, very few skills,” he said.

“And good people tend to move to better companies. So how we help our customers and end customers manage the skill deficit that they have, which is growing.”

Due to nearly every company adopting a hybrid strategy, Biyani said data ingestion volumes have gone “through the roof”.

"There is a data tsunami which we are facing, and that ultimately correlates back to the spend problem and the skills problem,” he warned.

“While you manage the scale, which is obviously unprecedented and growing, you have to manage the skills and the spend.”

Biyani added that these problems are also being faced in the ASEAN and Indian region.

Channel plans

The Securonix SVP said the company is aiming for a 100 percent partner focused ecosystem. Right now, they stand at about 80 percent channel.

“We are trying to try and take it 100 percent and there couldn't be a better time than now to double down and invest in partnerships in Australia,” he said.

Biyani noted it will take a “couple of years” to hit the 100 percent channel mark.

For the next year, Biyani wants to double the team in the Australian region.

“That's where we are absolutely committed in making the investments. But obviously it's a function of revenue, end of the day. We would like to double the revenue, double the team,” he said.

Biyani noted that Securonix wants to have more visibility in the market.

“We are going into the events, and we are creating our own community, themed sessions where we are creating more awareness and education,” he said.

“My expectation is by this time next year, we should have more partners on our side and more customers knowing about our brand and what we really do to help them.”

Message to partners

Speaking about their partners, Biyani said they will never have enough salespeople on their side, and they will never be able to scale without partners.

“Having the right partner on our side going to be our mantra to success and scaling this business,” he stated.

“I've made commitment to our board and our executive leadership in us that in three years' time, APJ will be minimum double the revenue that we stand today.”

Biyani highlighted that partners are going to be a “big part” of that plan.

“I look forward to working with our partners in Australia, to build more skills in the market around Securonix because we want to be selling a product and positioning a product,” he said.

“We want our partners to fulfil everything, the deployment, the integration, the services beyond deployment.”

Biyani noted that while Securonix focuses on the R&D, their partners will pick up the business around delivery, operations and integrations.

“We are not the big boys who also take up some revenue or take up some services dollars, we are absolutely going to double down and focus on our partners, and I think that's the best model to serve them,” he ended.