SUNNYVALE, Calif. – Feb 5, 2020

John Maddison, EVP of products and CMO at Fortinet

“Similar to our growing customer base, Fortinet’s partners recognize the value of Fortinet’s Secure SD-WAN solution providing integrated security, SD-WAN and enterprise-grade networking in a single offering. Our partners from various industries and backgrounds are benefitting immensely from our industry leading solution combined with Fortinet’s SD-WAN partner enablement initiatives. Fortinet is committed to accelerating our partner’s growth and enabling them to capitalize on the opportunity the SD-WAN market presents.”  

News Summary

Fortinet® (NASDAQ: FTNT), a global leader in broad, integrated and automated cybersecurity solutions, today announced continued momentum enabling partners to untap SD-WAN market opportunities with the Fortinet Secure SD-WAN solution and enablement initiatives.    

Network engineering and operation leaders struggle to facilitate digital innovation initiatives at branch and remote locations due to the limitations of traditional WAN infrastructures. As a result, organizations are turning to Software-defined wide-area networking (SD-WAN) as a preferred solution for replacing legacy WAN infrastructures within distributed organizations. This segment of the enterprise networking market will grow at a 30.8% compound annual growth rate (CAGR) from 2018 to 2023 to reach $5.25 billion, according to IDC’s SD-WAN Infrastructure Forecast.

As the SD-WAN market continues to grow, resellers and MSSPs need a Secure SD-WAN solution that consolidates networking, routing and security infrastructures into one single solution. Fortinet Secure SD-WAN is that solution, helping partners accelerate their customer’s WAN transformation, supporting high-performance digital applications and ensuring seamless security across branch deployments. Through Fortinet’s Secure SD-WAN solution and enablement initiatives, partners are able to better capitalize on the SD-WAN market opportunity.

Fortinet Secure SD-WAN Enablement Initiatives for Partners

Fortinet is helping partners sell Fortinet Secure SD-WAN and specialize in SD-WAN technology through several partner enablement initiatives. Through these initiatives, Fortinet partners are equipped to quickly and cost-effectively introduce differentiated software-defined networking solutions to generate new revenue streams, gain market share and deliver applications to customers on any network. Several tools aid in this initiative, including:

• SD-WAN Applications and Security Assessment Tool: Partners can leverage the Fortinet Cyber Threat Assessment Program (CTAP) for SD-WAN to understand their customers’ and prospects’ router usage and identify the potential security risks they face. An SD-WAN assessment can help organizations explore the value that FortiGate Secure SD-WAN offers their current edge networking infrastructure.
  
  The CTAP for SD-WAN helps partners demonstrate to customers and prospects the benefits of deploying Secure SD-WAN. Using the CTAP portal, partners are able to deploy a FortiGate inside of a customer or prospect’s network to monitor traffic patterns for up to a week. Using this data, partners are able to generate a report that includes findings around their applications, security and utilization in addition to actionable recommendations catered to the organization’s network. As a result, partners are able to discuss report findings with their customers and prospects to highlight the need to invest in a branch network infrastructure, thereby positioning themselves as a trusted advisor, and ultimately leading to potential expanded or new business.
• Secure SD-WAN Specialization Training: Fortinet offers Secure SD-WAN Specialization training designed to help partner sales and engineering teams develop the skills necessary to have productive conversations with customers about WAN cost optimization, increased cloud application performance and visibility, and a simplified branch network.
  
  Similarly, SD-WAN sales training for resellers helps their sales teams identify opportunities for Fortinet’s Secure SD-WAN offering. There is also an MSSP-specific sales training available to help managed service providers capitalize on SD-WAN service opportunities. Additionally, partners have the option to attend in-person Secure SD-WAN Fast Track training sessions to enhance their sales and technical skills. Partners can also learn how to best leverage the solution’s capabilities through Fortinet’s NSE Institute’s certification and training program which offers SD-WAN technical training.
• The Fortinet Partner Portal SD-WAN Hub: The SD-WAN Hub found on Fortinet’s Partner Portal provides partners with the tools necessary to help their customers move away from MPLS networks, lower their WAN operational costs, and update their existing WAN infrastructure with SD-WAN. There are three organizational sections within the SD-WAN Hub meant to help partners learn more about FortiGate Secure SD-WAN, promote their business, and convert sales prospects. Assets within the portal include start-up guides, a list of specific audiences and personas to target, email templates for prospecting, selling points, demand generation materials, solution briefs, and more.
• Partner Program Incentives: Partners are also eligible for incentives and promotions being run in each global region to drive and reward SD-WAN sales.

Increasingly, distributed organizations with remote offices are making the switch from performance-inhibited WANs to agile SD-WAN architectures that combine cost savings with significant performance enhancements. Fortinet partners are enabling customers to successfully reduce network costs and increase business agility through Secure SD-WAN. By leveraging the Secure SD-WAN enablement tools, partners are also gaining a competitive edge in the SD-WAN sales and management process, leading to an increase in customer loyalty, revenue and market share.

Supporting Quotes from Partners

“Built on Fortinet’s Secure SD-WAN, Masergy’s Managed SD-WAN solution gives clients software-defined network services and three tiered options for managed security services. It’s a winning combination that resonates with global enterprises needing cloud application performance, 24/7 threat monitoring, as well as incident response. Like Fortinet, we believe networking and security need to be inextricably tied, and resellers with a Fortinet-Masergy partnership address more needs across both IT domains.”

-Bob Laskey, Executive VP and Chief Revenue Officer, at Masergy

“Powernet is committed to offering the highest level of security and services to our customers. As a longtime Fortinet partner, Fortinet has allowed us to provide our customers with best-of-breed SD-WAN and security, helping us increase business opportunities with customers implementing WAN transformation projects. By delivering a unique combination of security, Wide Area Networking, cost savings and single-pane-of-glass management, it’s clear to us why Fortinet’s Secure SD-WAN solution is gaining significant adoption and industry recognition.”

-Christopher Ghosio, VP of Security and Network Engineering at Powernet

“Vector Security Networks partners with Fortinet to deliver highly desired networking and security functionality to a customer base that operates within multiple verticals. Our service offerings utilize Fortinet’s single bundle licensing model to leverage SD-WAN, UTM features, high-level routing capabilities, centralized management, policy packages and configuration templates. All of these features provide a stable and secure network for our customers all while encompassing a high-level service delivery offering within our engineering team. With Fortinet’s offering, we can deliver cutting edge managed services to our customer base.”

 -Brandon Basile, Vendor Relationships at Vector Security