Check Point and Nokia - the power of partnership. (Advertising Feature).

"Nokia and Check Point have already demonstrated a successful partnership by taking a leadership role in security appliances, which is among the fastest growing segments of the security market."

Chris Christiansen, vice president, Internet infrastructure and Security Software, IDC Companies across the UK and the rest of the world are already realising the great benefits from connecting their businesses via the Internet. To make the most of this potential, companies need security solutions that are easy to deploy and highly secure. They also need the support of trusted brands like Check Point and Nokia.

The IT vendors and resellers that can work together to provide these security solutions are set to reap the benefits of a huge market opportunity. A recent study by IDC forecasts that total worldwide IT security revenue, which reached over $14 billion in 2000 will increase to $46 billion by 2005.

VPNs: The way forward

There are several key areas where the growth will occur, predominantly amongst these is IP Virtual Private Networks (VPN). VPN technology has overturned the economics of e-business. Providing a cheap and hugely flexible alternative to frame relay, VPNs have opened up e-business opportunities to organisations of all sizes, transforming the way companies carry out business processes and connect with customers, suppliers, employees and business partners.

In Western Europe, the VPN services and equipment market is expected to grow from an IP VPN services market of $873.1 million and equipment worth $694.6 million in 2000 to a market opportunity in 2005 of $5.4 billion for IP VPN services and $2.2 billion market opportunity for IP VPN equipment. This is just one of the key solutions that the Check Point/Nokia partnership provides.

Traditionally VPNs have been predominantly used in the enterprise but now smaller companies are also tackling the issue of security. The time when a company could convincingly say "we are too small, no one would have any interest in hacking us" is gone. Whatever the physical size of a company, its potential and its competition is global. All companies have information valuable to their clients as well as their competitors, therefore a breach of the trust of a business relationship is often irreparable. Denial of Service and virus attacks have shown that even the single Internet user can 'house' an unwanted guest and be the base of damaging attacks. But very few small companies can dedicate the resources to manage a complex enterprise class security solution. What is needed is enterprise class without the complexity, at the right price.