Gartner Magic Quadrant for Enterprise Network Firewalls 2017: MSSP Reality Check

by Joe Panettieri • Jul 16, 2017

Welcome to page 2 of 2. Here, we cover the Challengers, Visionaries and Leaders Quadrants.

Gartner Magic Quadrant for Enterprise Network Firewalls: Visionaries

• Forcepoint: The company, formerly Raytheon|Websense, is a pure-play security vendor. It certainly has a partner program, but some of the materials are left over from the Websense days — as far back as 2010 — rather than forward looking. Also, some of the MSSP efforts were essentially punted from Intel to Forcepoint in mid-2016. Focus: Somewhat.
• Sophos: The company has major momentum with MSPs worldwide, and refers to many of those partners as MSSPs in multiple regions. The major Sophos focus area: One vendor, one management dashboard and one partner program for MSPs. The management dashboard, by the way, is called Sophos Central. MSSP Focus: Yes.

Gartner Magic Quadrant for Enterprise Network Firewalls: Challengers

• Cisco Systems: Cisco has bet its business on security over the past year. ChannelE2E describes the overall strategy here. Acquisitions like OpenDNS (now called Cisco Umbrella) have caught on with MSPs. SMB partners are calling for more products and services that specifically meet their customer needs, but Cisco has a strong footprint in the enterprise. MSSP Focus: Yes.
• Huawei: The company has limited presence outside of China, Gartner Notes. But Huawei is making progress in other regions, such as Latin America and Middle East. MSSP Focus: Emerging. One example involves ongoing work with Black Lotus, which Level 3 acquired in July 2015. CenturyLink has since acquired Level 3.

Gartner Magic Quadrant for Enterprise Network Firewalls: Leaders

• Check Point Software Technologies: One of the best-known providers of firewalls, Check Point has robust high-end solutions but sometimes is late to the SMB market with targeted offerings. MSSP Focus: Yes, though Check Point itself also is an MSSP of sorts.
• Fortinet: The company has a strong presence in SMB shortlists and a strong feature/price/performance offering, which help make it a frequent choice for UTM, Gartner asserts. Up in the enterprise, some key MSSPs now promote managed Fortinet firewalls to customers. MSSP Focus: Yes.
• Palo Alto Networks: The large, pure-play security vendor has more than 4,000 employees and 2016 revenue topped $1.4 billion, Gartner notes. MSSP Focus: Yes.

The Actual Magic Quadrant Layout

Here’s a look at the actual Magic Quadrant layout from Gartner…

Here endeth the Magic Quadrant and our views on vendor MSSP support.