The French operator wants to achieve €1 billion revenues from its cybersecurity business in 2022, through acquisitions and organic growth.
This week Orange completed the acquisition of SecureLink, which the it describes as “the leading independent cybersecurity player in Europe”, for €515 million.
SecureLink has more than 660 employees and reported revenues of €248 million in 2018.
Orange said that is saw the acquisition of SecureLink as a rare opportunity to help transform it into a leading European player: by its own estimates it is now in third place.
Scale and local presence
In an interview with Huges Foulon, EVP, Strategy & Cybersecurity, Orange, he said that while cybersecurity is about scale – needed to negotiate with vendor and to work with government and security agencies – it is also about having a local presence.
Orange has a cybersecurity presence in Belgium, Germany, the Netherlands, Nordics and the UK as well as France.
In its home market, it is the leading cybersecurity provider with 13% of the French market.
Foulon said this reflects the highly fragmented nature of cybersecurity – no single pan-European player has more than a 5% market share.
However, with many enterprises, including telcos, seeing cybersecurity and especially as a service, as a huge growth opportunity, a wave of consolidation is underway as larger providers seek scale and reach.
Growing fast
Foulon said that in particular Orange sees a big opportunity around securing the cloud and is looking to grow its pan-European cybersecurity business organically as well as by acquisition.
Orange Cyberdefense’s revenues were €303 million in 2018, up 12% on the previous year, but it has now doubled to about €600 million due to its acquisitions.
The operator acquired Atheos in 2014, Lexsi in 2016 and SecureData in 2019.