ARN

Victorian tech start-up completes first year customer blitz

Endpoint Focus branches out across a range of verticals since August 2016 launch.
Jarrod Vassallo (Endpoint Focus); Sam Lewis (Endpoint Focus) and David Stagg (Endpoint Focus)

Jarrod Vassallo (Endpoint Focus); Sam Lewis (Endpoint Focus) and David Stagg (Endpoint Focus)

Endpoint Focus has on-boarded 80 customers in 10 months, with the Melbourne-based device management start-up striking out across a range of verticals in Australia.

Since starting out in August 2016, the specialist endpoint provider has signed a range of managed services and ad hoc contracts, spanning media, financial services and travel, alongside state and local government.

“We target any company that works on Windows,” Endpoint Focus partner and consultant Jarrod Vassallo told ARN.

“We’re only 10 months in so we’re not exactly plotting deeply into specific verticals. We’ve done a lot of work in the media and publishing sector but it’s quite broad.”

Endpoint was started by Vassallo and business partners, David Stagg and Sam Lewis, providing specialised endpoint management services to enterprise customers across the country.

“Our goal was never to get hundreds of clients,” Vassallo added. “Our goal for the first year was to get the wheels turning and get our feet on the ground.

“We want to do what we do best for our clients, then look to scale in a few years.”

As an independent and Australian owned business, the company has already established key vendor partners, mixing tier-1 powerhouses with emerging players.

Specifically, Endpoint partners with Airlock Digital, Microsoft, Flexera Software and Thycotic, while also partnering with Adelaide-based security specialist, emt Distribution.

It also recently partnered with CrowdStrike, a company that has just raised another $100 million in funding with Telstra as one of its new investors.

“Our specialisation has allowed us to partner with vendors that are also specialised and in some instances, not even in the country yet until we partnered with them,” Vassallo said.

“We take a “technology first” approach and partner with vendors that are new, offer something different and are built from the ground up.”

Security play

From a managed services perspective, Endpoint offers as-a-service models around endpoint security and management, applications and escalation on demand.

“Our big focus is on endpoint security,” Vassallo said. “We come from a Windows engineering background, so we know the Windows endpoint well and we understand basic Windows management concepts.

“The rise of security threats has been a good opportunity for us to talk to clients about what they’re doing for their endpoints.”

According to Vassallo, Endpoint acts as a “good starting point” for businesses embarking on digital transformation strategies.

“You’ve got to move from point A to B first and a good mobility platform will enable that,” he explained. “The endpoint, for us, is the first point for digital transformation.”

As the appetite for public cloud in Australia increases, and businesses migrate to Amazon Web Services (AWS) and Microsoft Azure in particular, Lewis said the need for endpoint speciality services heightens.

And with increased demand, comes increased opportunity for the emerging start-up.

“A lot of the integrators that were traditionally desktop, endpoint management, etc. are now doing cloud,” Lewis added.

“Especially with some of the local, smaller integrators getting bought out by telcos – such as Kloud, Readify, and Ensyst – we saw an opportunity to be a boutique specialised endpoint services company so that we can service that market.”

Triggered by an increase in attack frequency, alongside more sophisticated hackers, the security space is changing at a rapid rate, with customers reassessing relationships with traditional vendors.

“Customers are finding that traditional vendors they use just aren’t working anymore because they’re just too slow for them,” Lewis said. “It could take up to seven days or sometimes months before a vendor will support attacks.

“A lot of vendors can’t keep up with the pace that threat attackers are releasing their malware viruses.”

According to Lewis, customers are now seeking next-generation solutions from a security standpoint, solutions that are tailored to cloud.

“These solutions will disrupt the market in the next 12 months or so,” he added.

Looking ahead, Lewis said Endpoint will continue recruiting around sales and marketing roles, alongside on-boarding “disruptive” vendors.

“We want to be leading age in the vendors that we pick,” he added. “We don’t just want to go with traditional vendors just because everyone partners with these specific vendors.

“We want to look at what’s new to market or not in Australia yet and offer that as a differentiator. We want the best experience and outcome for our clients because they’re at the centre of what we do and our growth should be for their benefit.”