Tanium’s Converge World Tour stopped off in London recently to spread the word about converged endpoint management and the solutions the company can provide to partners and customers, as well as the potential of developing technologies such as AI to bring further opportunities.
World tours are usually the preserve of pop stars such as Taylor Swift and aren’t generally associated with security and endpoint management solutions providers. But for selected partners and customers of converged endpoint management (XEM) provider Tanium in London on May 21, they got to see the latest stop in the company’s Converge World Tour.
And, like the best tours from pop stars, it was a mixture of greatest hits and new material. At the conference, attendees heard from a range of Tanium customers and partners, company leadership and industry luminaries about security best practices, industry trends and had the opportunity to learn more about new autonomous capabilities like Tanium Automate, which is designed to empower customers to automate complex tasks at speed and scale.
Customers like Electrolux, Unilever and Weir Group, alongside partners including NCC Group and Avanade, showcased how they are able to consolidate disparate security solutions on a single platform to reduce the costs, risks and silos associated with outdated approaches.
The Converge World Tour, which also took in stops in Paris, Munich and Tokyo during May and June, is a spinoff from Tanium’s annual Partner Summit, which is held in the US where the company is headquartered every November.
Energising the partner ecosystem
“The Converge World Tour looks to energise our partner ecosystem and give them insights into our growth strategy and new product introductions around AI,” explains Tony Beller, senior vice president of global partner sales at Tanium. “The second part of the event in London saw our CEO, CMO and product team announcing new features on our products.”
In addition, attendees were given an early insight into the automated endpoint management solution that Tanium plans to launch this November at its global Converge summit, Tony adds.
The response from people who attended the Converge World Tour has been overwhelmingly positive, according to Tony. “Our partners are super excited about the new products,” he says. “Our strategy for our partners is about growth and building service offerings around our products and solutions. With this new product introduction, they see a lot of potential to develop their offerings.
“Most of our partners have since approached us asking about how they could get early access to it because they want to start building offerings and capabilities around those. Customers too are excited, and they want to get their hands on it as soon as possible.
“Prospective partners and customers have also been intrigued as to how our products are progressing.”
New channel partner
The UK stop on the World Tour is just part of Tanium’s plans to grow its presence in the UK in the coming years. With an aggressive growth strategy planned for the UK, to this end, Tanium has recently announced a new channel partner in the UK, e92plus, adding to the company’s existing relationship with Exclusive Networks.
“This new partnership came about because we’re growing so fast in the UK, so we needed to expand our network,” says Tony.
He adds that Tanium is targeting customers across the spectrum with its XEM solutions, from small to mid-market and large corporates.
“We are going to need additional distribution partners to help us with that market,” Tony says. “I met with the CEO and head of sales at e92plus while I was in the UK to discuss how we want to move forward and they’re super excited and are ramping up their training as E92plus is not just a distributor, they also provide services. We’re super excited about that partnership and have high hopes for it.”
Market strategy
As mentioned, Tanium is ramping up its growth strategy in the UK and is targeting enterprise businesses and major accounts – those with 10,000 endpoints and above – and mid-market and commercial businesses, which have fewer than 10,000 endpoints, Tony says.
“For larger customers, we are aggressively working with large GSIs, such as Kyndryl and Avanade, and we have strong partnerships with Microsoft and ServiceNow,” he says. “For mid-market and commercial sectors, Tanium has a strong partnership with CDW. We’re developing a joint go-to-market strategy, specifically for the UK, for the mid-market segment with CDW currently.”
Tanium’s partner ecosystem in the UK – and globally – involves distributors and resellers as well as DSIs and SIs, and a strong managed services partner (MSP) ecosystem. “A lot of partners are building managed services, specifically around security,” says Tony. “We have some strong MSPs, which have ServiceNow offerings that they’re adding Tanium into to complement that.
“A good example of that is Plat4mation, a Dutch company with a presence across Europe with ServiceNow. They are adding Tanium into their offering and bringing it to the UK and the rest of continental Europe.”
Unique position
Understandably, Tony is confident about the future of Tanium in the UK. As the only XEM provider in the UK, it gives the company an advantage over other providers in the space.
Tony is also confident about the potential for Tanium Guardian, a solution that highlights early threat information and the latest updates and identifies specific endpoints that may be compromised. Additionally, it provides pertinent security content and recommendations for threat mitigation. This was launched in November 2023 at that year’s Converge event.
“We are still in the early stages for Guardian,” says Tony. “That shows some of the AI and automation features that we’re building into our platform. It has been very well received by the market and we’re receiving a lot of great feedback for this from those that already use it, specifically from large enterprise customers.
“We’re seeing a lot of momentum on that. We’re obviously very excited about what we’re going to announce and finally deploy in November.”
AI influence
Tanium’s investment into AI reflects the influence the company believes it will have on the market in the coming years – and Tony is confident it will present plenty of opportunities to develop revenue streams.
“We believe that those AI capabilities will double the size of our market, so it will bring us opportunities for a lot more growth,” he says. “Not only will AI provide more automated solutions for partners, it will also require more security solutions as cybercriminals look to exploit its potential.”
One area of potential is Microsoft’s Copilot AI assistant. Tanium are long-standing partners with Microsoft. “Many of our joint customers are preparing for the AI power future,” Tony says. “When you look at Tanium and Copilot together, they want to exploit all that it offers to help become faster, more efficient and reduce risk.”
Positive outlook
Overall, Tony is positive about the prospects for the sector – and an indicator of that is the consolidation in the market currently as businesses look to grow. Investment is also coming into the sector, another good indicator for the strength of the market.
“There’s a lot of consolidation, and businesses are always looking for best-in-class platforms and Tanium is front and centre of that,” says Tony.
Likewise, as the threats from cyberattacks continue to increase in volume and sophistication, Tanium is well placed to pick up business. “We leverage AI and automation, which means that as threats increase in sophistication, companies are looking for speed and scale in their solutions as those threats can come in seconds,” he says. “That’s why the Tanium message resonates so well with the market in general as we tackle the threats a lot faster than others.
“We’re seeing high demand for what we offer from customers, as we offer a platform and much broader solutions to reduce risk that they haven’t got inside the enterprise.”
Looking forward
Looking towards the end of the year and on into 2025, Tony believes the introduction of AI and automation solutions later this year is going to open a lot more opportunities for the company. “If you look at markets like Europe with a lot of regulation coming up around Dora, it’s increasingly becoming more apparent that we are the platform of choice for a lot of those customers,” he says.
“I see a lot of MSPs moving into our platform, because we provide an operation for our customers that is faster and more automated than the competition. I think in the next year we’ll see an acceleration of adoption of automation and AI in vulnerability and risk assessment and more broadly in
the market.”
With the technology moving on apace, and interest in AI and automation rising, the next time the Converge World Tour rolls into town, then clamour for tickets is likely to rival that seen for artists like Taylor Swift.
