Barracuda MSP adds XDR and SOC with Skout buy

Barracuda has acquired Skout Cybersecurity in a move designed to add more depth to the options it can provide for managed service providers (MSPs).

The deal will give Barracuda MSP its first SOC offering, which will help it support managed service providers operating across Europe, the Middle East and Africa.

Skout Cybersecurity also comes with a strong track record in the extended detection and response (XDR) market, with a platform and service offering there, which will also add more depth for its new owner. 

“MSPs must be able to protect their customers’ users, their devices, and the data they are accessing with these devices against increasingly sophisticated threats. To achieve this level of protection for their customers, and themselves, MSPs are transforming their businesses into security-centric operations,” said Brian Babineau, senior vice-president and general manager at Barracuda MSP. 

“The addition of Skout enables Barracuda’s MSP partners to deploy security solutions across their environments, connecting their data feeds into a unified, 24x7 operation for swift analysis and response,” he added.

If all goes to plan, the deal will close this month and the firm will soon start sharing the fruits of the acquisition with MSPs. The latest deal will add to Barracuda’s recent purchase of zero-trust access provider Fyde and its 2019 acquisition of InfiSecure Technologies.

The Barracuda deal comes just a couple of days after Kaseya revealed that security and automation were high priorities for customers.

The firm, which supports MSPs, shared the findings of its 2021 IT operations survey, with IT professionals indicating that their top priorities were security, cloud migration and automation.

Fending off threats and getting on top of data protection was the main challenge that IT professionals were facing going forward. Firms indicated that the areas they planned to invest in next year included email security tools, such as phishing prevention, and ransomware protection.

The survey also revealed that there were still some educational issues for the channel to deal with to help customers get on top of data protection. The vast majority of those quizzed (82%) said they understood software-as-a-service (SaaS) applications like Google Workspace and Office 365, but 60% expected the providers to be responsible for data protection.

“The results of the 2021 survey demonstrate that security continues to be a top priority for IT professionals and will remain a major challenge as the surge in cyber attacks continues. Kaseya anticipated this trend and has structured its IT Complete suite of solutions to provide comprehensive protection for SMBs to stop threats like credential compromise and phishing,” said Mike Puglia, chief strategy officer at Kaseya.