Channel Awards 2024: Q&A with Egress

Daniel Hoy, VP of partnerships sheds light on the vendor’s biggest challenges, how the channel has changed, and gives an update on KnowBe4’s acquisition of Egress

Cloud email security platform Egress is one of the finalists for this year’s CRN Channel Awards.

After making the shortlist for Security Vendor of the Year, Daniel Hoy, VP of partnerships at Egress talks to CRN ahead of the biggest night of the year for the channel.

An experienced leader, Hoy has spent time growing and managing teams to deliver continuous revenue growth.

Believing the cybersecurity industry can only unlock its full potential when working together, Hoy puts relationships at the centre of all his work.

As VP of strategic partnerships, he oversees Egress’ global partner program, working with VARs and MSPs to identify areas of high-growth potential and deliver positive outcomes for partners and customers.

Why do you think awards like the Channel Awards matter? What would winning this award mean to your company?

The Channel Awards have always been regarded as the highest accolade in the UK Channel, allowing partners and vendors to showcase their successes and benchmark their progress.

Winning Security Vendor of the Year would be a fantastic achievement for Egress, a KnowBe4 company! This year, we implemented a 100 per cent channel model and, as a result, our UK partner program experienced a 155 per cent increase in partner generated bookings, with 30 per cent of all new logo wins generated by partners.

It would be awesome to celebrate these achievements with our partners and team.

What would you say is your company’s proudest achievement over the past year?

We’ve seen two significant changes this year. Since January 1, we’ve operated a 100 per cent channel model, which has provided a platform for us to add even more value to our partners, which in turn has significantly accelerated growth for partner-generated opportunities.

Additionally in July, KnowBe4, the provider of the world’s largest security awareness training and simulated phishing platform, completed its acquisition of Egress. This is incredibly exciting news on several levels for both Egress and our partners!

KnowBe4 and Egress already provide a bidirectional integration that enables joint customers to leverage live threat intelligence from Egress to personalise their KnowBe4 security awareness training and phishing simulation program.

This means people are automatically enrolled in highly tailored and relevant modules that reflect the actual threats they face and the risk they present to the organisation. As a result, our partners are able to maximise the value joint customers derived from our combined products.

Additionally, as the world’s largest training provider, KnowBe4 has an expansive customer base worldwide, which offers significant and exciting opportunity to cross-sell the Egress Intelligent Email Security platform to generate more revenue from their existing KnowBe4 accounts.

What have been the biggest challenges of 2024 so far and how have you overcome them? How have your people helped with that?

Cybersecurity budgets continue to be squeezed at a time when the risk of cyberattacks and breaches has never been higher! This puts ever-increasing pressure on the UK channel and their vendors to mitigate these threats and prove long-term value.

In response, Egress continues to deliver the highest standards of email security and make ongoing investment into our partners, so that customers receive the best technical solution and service to ensure demonstrable ROI.

We make it easy for our partners to integrate the Egress Intelligent Email Security platform into their portfolios and pass the value onto their customers. It’s this product excellence, combined with our compelling competitive positioning, repeatable profitability, and support from the Egress Partner Team that has driven 155 per cent partner growth over the last 12 months.

How do you think the channel has changed over the past year and what changes do you think it still needs to make?

Over the last 18 months there’s been a considerable shift in how customers want to engage with channel suppliers and vendors.

Continually expected to do more with less, organisations are demanding more from their suppliers. Gone are the days of the simple resell model: now, every supplier must demonstrate consultancy, technical, and commercial value.

As a result, we have seen an increasing number of MSPs and MSSPs enter the market, alongside boutique cyber specialist VARs – all looking to build repeatable and recurring revenue streams. Inevitably, this has made a crowded market more competitive!

This should be a good thing for customers, who now receive enhanced services from their partners, as well as for vendors like Egress, who can demonstrate competitive and technical excellence to support our partners.

What do you see as the main opportunities for the channel in the coming year? How do you plan to capitalise on those opportunities?

AI has changed the game for cybercriminals – and we’re going to continue seeing an increase in the volume of highly targeted advanced phishing attacks. Organisations will have to respond – and by layering AI into their cybersecurity tech stack, they can detect and prevent a broader spectrum of attacks, while increasing their resilience.

This represents an opportunity for accelerated growth for Egress and our partners to sell our AI-driven email security platform globally, helping customers protect their organisations and achieve tangible ROI on their email security investments.