Web Filtering Feast

Whether you are in the security market or not, the Web filtering market is about to get very interesting for the channel.

LARRY HOOPER Can be reached at (415) 947-6229 or via e-mail at lrhooper@cmp.com.

Established players Websense and SurfControl are stepping up their games and working to lock in partners as rivals nibble at the market edges. Enterprise leader Websense is pushing into the midmarket as SurfControl works its way into the enterprise. Blue Coat, once a technology partner of Websense, is now offering its own URL filtering on its products. The intensity in the market is creating fierce competition for the attention of solution providers.

The first signs of that competition came in January, when McAfee President Gene Hodges jumped ship to become the CEO of market leader Websense. Hodges stirred the pot again when he recently hired McAfee channel chief David Roberts to become Websense’s vice president of sales.

A polite man, Hodges said that Websense had perhaps not been as attentive to the channel as it should have been. Partners were less polite. They said that Websense has been taking deals direct, passing renewals off to favorite partners and doing it with an arrogance that they hadn’t seen before in the channel.

For his part, Hodges vowed to turn Websense into a 100 percent channel company from top to bottom. Bringing in Roberts, who will run both sales and channels, is a big part of that effort.

Burned before, many Websense partners are skeptical that Hodges and Roberts can pull it off. But these two men have done it before. They were part of the team that turned McAfee into a CRN Channel Champion award-winning company, taking it from 40 percent direct sales to virtually none.

Meanwhile, Websense rival SurfControl is taking Hodges seriously as well, working on revamping some of its channel programs and last week rolling out a 105 percent no-channel-conflict guarantee, pledging to pay a partner 105 percent of the margin it would have earned if a SurfControl sales rep takes a deal direct.

Any way you slice it, it’s all good for solution providers. McAfee continues to be a strong channel player, and the increased competition is creating two more companies with an even stronger channel focus.

Which company will you place your bet on? Let me know at (415) 947-6229 or via e-mail at lrhooper@cmp.com.