Cisco claims best of breed security solutions

Is it possible to be both a security market share leader and have best of breed solutions? Cisco thinks so.
The two terms market share leader & best of breed have always been antonyms in the security space. Cisco has been advocating a systems based approach to security for some time. In the past, customers felt they had two choices, either go with a single vendor systems based approach or go with a multi-vendor best of breed point product approach. Now Cisco is trying to change that. Here is a quote from their new approach,

”Cisco Self-Defending Network: Combining Best-of-Breed Products and Services with a Systems Approach. To meet today’s security challenges, businesses need both best-of-breed product capabilities and the ability to plan, design, integrate, and operate those capabilities as an overarching, autonomous system. Only one security vendor can provide such a solution: Cisco®.”

That seems like a tall order for Cisco. Especially given that most customers still do not even recognize Cisco’s dominance in security market share for many security products. And Cisco has held some of those positions for years. Now Cisco is attempting to convince the market it offers best of breed products as well.

A case in point is analysts pronounce that Cisco owns the number one market share for all of the following: FW, IPS, VPN, NAC, AAA, XML firewall, Email security appliances, SIMS appliances, and overall security products revenue. Wow that is quite a list! However, there has traditionally been a strong perception that Cisco is not a best of breed player in the security market. With so many small, agile, niche security companies it seems an impossibility that a lumbering market share leader, carrying the baggage that comes with having a large installed customer base, could move fast enough to compete for best of breed status on a consistent basis. The reasoning used is that the bigger/established companies that are market share leaders just can’t move as fast as the smaller niche vendors can and therefore cannot maintain a best of breed solution. Makes some sense to me. But has Cisco found a way around this limitation? Well, I’ll let you decide that. However, Cisco’s newest self-defending network campaign is targeted at convincing companies it is capable of being both.

A “best of breed” label is very product/solution specific and does not lend itself to a blanket yes or no answer on a per vendor basis. It requires us to drill down into each product/solution in the security space. On the other hand, it can be argued that the security market is moving to an end-to-end single vendor story where products collaborate amongst each other to create a more secure environment. Several vendors, Cisco included, are gobbling up companies that allow them to fill in their end-to-end security solution gaps. So should end-to-end security solution be a best of breed category by itself then? I think so.

What criteria should be used to identify a best of breed product? Who decides what is and is not best of breed? Not easy questions. Ask 10 people what they consider to be the best of breed firewall and you’ll likely get at least 2 or 3 different answers. So is the best of breed moniker controlled by individuals, group think, by vendors, by periodicals like NW, or by analysts. I think the answer is yes to all of them. This makes it a pretty tough assignment for a company like Cisco to change its image to best of breed. It is definitely not something that will change overnight, but rather through a slow process of continuously producing quality, innovative security products. Best of breed status needs to be earned. And of course Cisco acquiring best of breed companies, like Ironport, Altiga, Perfigo, Okena, and others always helps.