Monday, March 25, 2013

“Europe was not Worth The Hard Work we Put In!”

Natalya Kaspersky, Chairman & Co-Founder of Kaspersky Labs and Infowatch, The Leading Anti-Virus and Data loss Protection Software group in the European and Chinese market Expresses her concerns over the Global it Security market, and The Past and Present of her Group Companies, to B&E’s.

B&E: Of late, much is being discussed about the market for technologies that will help control corporate information flow and protect IPRs. Do you have a positive feeling about this growth?
Natalya Kaspersky (NK): Yes, absolutely. The current market trend tells us that data protection is increasingly becoming the prime concern for any firm, due to the rapidly growing amount of data. Problem is, this growth is happening in an unstructured manner. So, you end up losing valuable information. WikiLeaks is an example. The solution to this problem is to curb leakage of intellectual property. And to achieve the same, the first thing to be done is to put in a lot of effort to first recognise what exactly you want protected.

B&E: You are also the CEO of InfoWatch, a company whose goal is to deal with information leakage and where you hold a controlling stake. In October 2010, the company launched a new software called “Infowatch Traffic Monitor Autolinguist”. What is so new about the product?
NK: Actually, Autolinguist is not a very new product, but it effectively helps to categorise and protect vital information.

B&E: Your company has also been active in the Middle East markets of late. How has the response been so far?
NK: Middle East has reacted positively. We started targeting the Middle East markets effectively, only last autumn, and therefore it is too early to speak of results. Also, we need to understand here that the business of data leakage prevention is rather a cyclical one, because people first want to try the offering. This usually takes 3-4 months. Then comes the issue of payments. Companies take some time to finalise contracts because usually, the deal sizes are well in excess of $100,000, a sum which many are not comfortable parting with. So, they end up deciding to buy only the limited editions. But having said that, the fact that we do have ongoing projects in the Middle-East, is already a great beginning.

B&E: You are the #1 anti-virus brand in Europe. To understand that you achieved it in just three years, speaks volumes about how smooth your growth in that region has been. Has your growth across all product categories been this easy in Europe?
NK: Actually, I would not give a thumbs up to our journey in Europe being an easy one. Bringing about changes in mindsets in Europe is not an easy task. In Europe, there are different regulations in different countries. So, our basic assumption that all nations in EU would react similarly to our plans and offerings was wrong. There, local laws dominate decision-making and this differs from country to country.


Source : IIPM Editorial, 2012.
An Initiative of IIPM, Malay Chaudhuri
and Arindam Chaudhuri (Renowned Management Guru and Economist).

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