As part of its strategy to grow its business in West Africa, Kaspersky has partnered with value-added distributor DataGroupIT who will provide the global cybersecurity company with access to new markets in Nigeria and Ghana.

“DataGroupIT is a well-known distributor in Africa with a clear value-add when it comes to generating focused business growth, especially in the enterprise segment. It also has the capacity to support the Kaspersky business logistically and provide valuable technical expertise on Kaspersky solutions,” says Lehan van den Heever, enterprise cyber security advisor for Kaspersky in Africa.

DataGroupIT has more than 1 000 clients in over 15 Sub-Saharan African countries with its professional teams delivering exceptional sales, pre-sale, logistic, marketing, and financial support.

The partnership between the two organisations will further enhance Kaspersky’s rapidly expanding footprint in Africa. It is designed to empower customers to leverage Kaspersky’s knowledge, market intelligence, and world-class cyber security professionals with best-in-class local market support.

“West Africa is becoming a major focus for Kaspersky. The agreement with DataGroupIT will see Kaspersky gain access to new verticals in this region while helping new and existing customers build their cybersecurity strategy. It also puts Kaspersky in a position to work with major regulators to elevate the digital protection threshold across the region,” says van den Heever.

Amir Shtarkman, vice-president: business development at DataGroupIT, says: “Our partnership with Kaspersky is an excellent fit for our growing product portfolio, and our ‘6 pillar model’. Kaspersky is an experienced vendor and a leader on their product portfolio. Their offerings will enable our customers across the region to realise the benefits of cybersecurity and, in particular, endpoint protection and cyber intelligence. DataGroupIT has a wealth of experience in the cybersecurity market in Africa, and we are looking forward to growing the Kaspersky business with this partnership.”

With the DataGroupIT partnership in place, Kaspersky plans to replicate the success it has observed in other African regions.

“This expansion will help move the maturity of cyber defence tools and processes in West Africa to a new level especially at a time when organisations and consumers are adapting to a new distributed working environment that creates the potential for additional cyber risk,” concludes van den Heever.