California-based encryption software company PGP is seeking partners in Latin America, where it is also considering opening offices, the company's regional manager for Americas distribution, Alvaro Freyre told BNamericas.
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PGP currently is partnered with Chilean security services provider Soluciones Orion and the Latin American unit of Spanish IT wholesaler Afina. Freyre said that its channel partners generated roughly 95% of PGP's regional revenues.
PGP is considering ways to develop the company's relationship with its current channel partners, including sales and technology training. The company is also looking to expand its coverage, particularly in Brazil and Mexico, through a combination of new partners and offices.
"If you look at the size of the regional IT market, one-third of the demand comes out of Brazil, and approximately one-third of the demand comes out of Mexico," he said. "When we think about when and where we will put the first full-time PGP person on the ground, it has to be in Mexico or Brazil."
PGP has doubled its regional sales consistently during the past few years, Freyre said without providing hard figures. He added that PGP expects the growth trend to continue and that the company is waiting for slightly higher revenues in Latin America before setting up full-time operations.
LAPTOPS, REGULATION FUEL REGIONAL ENCRYPTION DEMAND
Latin America has caught up to the rest of the world in terms of laptop penetration, which now account for half of the PC sales in many counties throughout the region, according to the executive.
He said regional companies are taking steps to safeguard against data loss from those devices, adding that e-mail and mobile device encryption are also increasing rapidly.
Increasing regulation is also driving the adoption of encryption, particularly in the financial sector, and that demand is filtering down from larger companies to medium-sized companies.
"Demand is primarily coming from larger companies," Freyre said. "But then, larger companies are requiring that their partner companies use encryption."
He added that in expanding connections with its channel partners, the company expects to make encryption more available to the SMEs in the future.
Carina Löbel, senior analyst for software and IT services at IDC Chile, previously told BNamericas that the Latin American security market was expected to grow 20.2% this year to US$384mn from the US$319mn recorded in 2007.
The total includes identity and access management, secure content and threat management solutions, as well as other security software such as encryption and security and vulnerability management. Of those segments, the largest in Latin America is secure content, which makes up some US$250mn.
