CrowdStrike Endpoint Protection Invests in Automox Patch Management -

CrowdStrike, an endpoint protection platform provider, has participated in Automox's Series B funding to drive cybersecurity hygiene and patch management software tools.

Koch Disruptive Technologies led the $30 million funding round, with participation from CRV and TechOperators.

Automox will use the Series B funding to accelerate its platform development efforts and expand its sales and marketing teams, according to a prepared statement. In addition, the Series B funding brings Automox's total financing to date to $42 million.

CrowdStrike and Automox previously announced a partnership in November 2019 at CrowdStrike's Fal.Con UNITE user conference in San Diego, California. With the agreement, CrowdStrike provides access to the Automox console as a third-party application via the CrowdStrike Store.

MSPs, MSSPs and Patch Management Automation

Patch management automation remains a hot topic and focus area for MSPs and MSSPs -- both for internal use and for customer automation.

Still, Automox will face competition in the MSP and MSSP market -- where multiple RMM (remote monitoring and management) and cyber software companies offer automated patch management capabilities and feature sets.

Options include NinjaRMM. "While Automox certainly has a powerful system, NinjaRMM has a few key advantages over it," according to Kodie Dower, a media relations manager at the RMM software provider. "For starters, Ninja benefits from a truly all-in-one system; any technician that is dealing with endpoint management is likely going to be interacting with a host of other IT management tools, so products need to Swiss Army Knife-like. Ninja represents a more encompassing tool that can be of value across a wide section of the IT tool chain. Ninja also has feature parity at least with Automox and we’re constantly adding new features and updates, so our core product is only getting stronger and more robust."

Additional patch management options include Qualys, which has deep MSSP relationships. The Qualy Patch Management (PM) cloud app, launched in 2019, is designed for IT and security teams

CrowdStrike Announces MSSP Partnerships

Meanwhile, CrowdStrike continues to partner on multiple fronts. In addition to the Automox investment, recent CrowdStrike engagements include:

Delta Risk: Delta Risk, a Top 200 MSSP for 2019, last month joined the CrowdStrike Elevate Partner Program and uses the CrowdStrike Falcon endpoint protection platform to help businesses improve their security posture.

Baidam Solutions: Baidam Solutions in December 2019 became CrowdStrike’s first Australian indigenous channel partner and delivers Falcon security capabilities to Australian businesses.

eSentire: eSentire, a Top 200 MSSP and Top 20 managed detection and response (MDR) service provider, in December integrated Falcon endpoint detection and response and next-generation antivirus capabilities into its MDR solution.

CrowdStrike specializes in cloud-delivered endpoint security and uses artificial intelligence to provide endpoint visibility and protection. It offers Falcon, which correlates 2 trillion security events per week to help organizations detect and prevent cyberattacks

Additional insights from Joe Panettieri.