2018 Security 100: 20 Coolest Endpoint Security Vendors

Defending The Endpoint

New and sophisticated threats such as zero-day malware, trojans and advanced persistent threats are putting companies' data at risk. As a result, organizations are increasingly deploying endpoint security offerings to safeguard their ecosystems against potential cyberattacks.

Anti-virus offeringss are expected to retain the largest market share due to the growing demand for mobile and tablet protections, according to research firm MarketsandMarkets. But endpoint device control offerings are expected to enjoy the most rapid growth as BYOD adoption in organizations continues to increase.

The endpoint security market is expected to hit $17.38 billion by 2020, according to MarketsandMarkets, with North America retaining the largest market share due to the presence of a large number of security vendors.

As part of CRN's annual Security 100 list, here's a look at 20 companies making their mark in the endpoint security arena.

Avast Software

Vincent Steckler, CEO

Headquarters: Prague, Czech Republic

Avast launched three new anti-virus offerings and three management offerings aimed at the SMB market. Anti-virus features include identity protection, password management, data protection services, and full endpoint protection for file, email, web and spam. The management offerings can help deliver remote monitoring and management, endpoint protection management, and site security assessment.

Bitdefender

Florin Talpes, Founder, CEO

Headquarters: Bucharest, Romania

Bitdefender unveiled an offering in May that identifies and isolates attacks at the hypervisor level and provides an agentless way to deliver memory introspection around the Citrix XenServer. Seven months later, the company snagged former Fortinet channel leader Joe Sykora for a newly created position focused on standardizing the structure, benefits and governance around Bitdefender's partner program.

Bromium

Gregory Webb, CEO

Headquarters: Cupertino, Calif.

Bromium in August unveiled the launch of Bromium Secure App Extensions to extend its protection capabilities to legacy applications. The offering uses virtualization for application isolation and control, making sure each legacy application is hardware-isolated in a micro-VM. Bromium said the product can be used to protect some of the most vulnerable software running in business and government.

Carbon Black

Patrick Morley, President, CEO

Headquarters: Waltham, Mass.

Carbon Black said its latest version of Cb Defense would fuse next-generation anti-virus and endpoint detection and response together to better protect against fileless attacks or unknown tactics. The company also unveiled its vision for the Predictive Security Cloud, which consolidates endpoint data in the cloud to provide industry-leading protection from both malware and non-malware attacks.

CounterTack

Neal Creighton, CEO

Headquarters: Waltham, Mass.

CounterTack in May announced a $20 million Series D round led by new investors Singtel Innov8 and SAP National Security Services. The company partnered with NTT Security to help enterprises worldwide detect and respond to unknown malware, insider threats, data loss prevention, fileless malware and forensics, and expanded its presence in Japan with a Tokyo office to advance the partnership.

CrowdStrike

George Kurtz, Co-Founder, President, CEO

Headquarters: Sunnyvale, Calif.

Following a $100 million Series D funding round in May led by Accel Partners, CrowdStrike set its sights on global expansion, engineering and technology innovation, new partner relationships, and new sales and marketing investments. Two months later, the company appointed former AppDynamics vice president Matthew Polly to lead its global channels, alliances and business development.

Cyberbit

Adi Dar, Founder, CEO

Headquarters: Ra'anana, Israel

Cyberbit in April released a new version of its endpoint detection and response (EDR) platform that provides pure-behavioral, IOC-less detection combined with a new anti-ransomware engine. Four months later, the company unveiled a new smart building project which combines its EDR with Cyberbit's proprietary OT security and SOAR (security orchestration automation and response) solutions, bringing Cyberbit's technology to smart-buildings, critical infrastructure and national CERT customers.

Cybereason

Lior Div, Co-Founder, CEO

Headquarters: Boston

Cybereason hired its first channel chief and launched its inaugural partner program, offering free sales and enablement training, technical training, deal registration, MDF and discounts as companies move up the tiers. The company also landed $100 million in a Series D round led by previous investor SoftBank, and plans to use the money to be more aggressive in its go-to-market push, including via partners.

Cylance

Stuart McClure, Founder, CEO

Headquarters: Irvine, Calif.

Cylance in May expanded beyond its endpoint protection roots with the launch of an endpoint detection and response offering that uses artificial intelligence to carry out root cause analysis of threats, threat hunting, increased visibility and incident response. Three months later, the company hired former AlienVault executive Brian Robbins as CFO, adding a leader with both IPO and acquisition experience.

Dell Security

Michael Dell, Chairman, CEO

Headquarters: Round Rock, Texas

Dell Security can help protect, control and monitor data anywhere, while multifactor authentication ensures the right person accesses the data. With advanced threat prevention such as anti-malware, BIOS verification and self-healing endpoint visibility, the company can detect and respond to breaches faster and remedy them more effectively.

Endgame

Nathaniel Fick, CEO

Headquarters: Arlington, Va.

Endgame in July integrated its full-stack endpoint visibility and protection against malicious attacks with Corvil’s network visibility and user tracking capabilities to help security teams detect more, sooner. Three months later, the company landed former SecureWorks executive Matthew Bruening to lead Endgame's sales staff as the company continues its growth in the commercial and federal sectors.

Kaspersky Lab

Eugene Kaspersky, CEO

Headquarters: Moscow

Kaspersky Lab launched a new program for MSP partners that includes access to volume-based pricing, formalized monthly licensing, product and security training and certification, and technical support. The company also named Jason Stein as its new head of North American channels, who plans to focus on technical product expertise, new ways to get revenue, and messaging for the sales and channel teams.

Malwarebytes

Marcin Kleczynski, CEO

Headquarters: Santa Clara, Calif.

Malwarebytes in June released a new single endpoint agent cloud platform that features a signature-less anomaly detection engine powered by machine learning. It is intended to be a more effective and efficient replacement for anti-virus. Two months later, the company released Malwarebytes for Mac, which automatically block and removes malware, adware and potentially unwanted programs.

McAfee

Christopher Young, CEO

Headquarters: Santa Clara, Calif.

McAfee made its first big acquisition since spinning off from Intel with the buy of cloud access security broker Skyhigh Networks to establish a dominant position around cloud cybersecurity. The company also brought its Data Exchange Layer together with Cisco's Platform Exchange Grid to facilitate the sharing of threat event context and automation across the network and endpoint security frameworks.

Microsoft

Satya Nadella, CEO

Headquarters: Redmond, Wash.

Microsoft focuses on securing corporate data and managing risk by ensuring accounts are authenticated prior to granting access to a company's business-critical data and protecting organizations by detecting suspicious behavior and malicious activities. The company also allows customers to get a full picture of their security posture across the entire organization with built-in intelligence and recommendations.

SentinelOne

Tomer Weingarten, Co-Founder, CEO

Headquarters: Mountain View, Calif.

SentinelOne landed two top executives from competitors, snagging Cylance head of worldwide sales Nicholas Warner to be chief revenue officer and former Proofpoint channel chief Dee Dee Acquista to be head of worldwide channels. The company also unveiled a partnership with SonicWall to bring policy-based enforcement, remediation, automation, and dynamic detection across the endpoint and network.

Sophos

Kris Hagerman, CEO

Headquarters: Oxfordshire, England

Sophos in October launched the latest version of its XG Firewall, which leverages information from the endpoint to classify previously unclassified network traffic and applications coming through the firewall. Three months later, the company rolled out the latest version of its Intercept X anti-exploit application to the general public, incorporating deep-learning technology to boost malware detection rates.

Symantec

Greg Clark, CEO

Headquarters: Mountain View, Calif.

Symantec unveiled Endpoint Security for the Cloud Generation, taking advantage of recent acquisitions and organic R&D projects to integrate five technologies into a single-agent architecture. The company also partnered to provide security around Microsoft Azure and Office 365, giving customers better control over cloud usage, while preventing data leaks and ensuring regulatory and corporate compliance.

Tanium

Orion Hindawi, Co-Founder, CEO

Headquarters: Emeryville, Calif.

Tanium in May landed $100 million in new financing, which the company said will be used for general corporate purposes and providing liquidity to institutional and employee equity holders. Two months later, the firm unveiled Tanium Threat Response, which allows security operations teams to detect a broad range of attacks with out-of-the-box intelligence, real-time alerting and a stellar user experience.

Webroot

Mike Potts, President, CEO

Headquarters: Broomfield, Colo.

Webroot expanded its security training offerings for MSPs and launched its own security awareness services following its acquisition of Securecast. The company also brought former Lancope CEO Mike Potts on as CEO, who plans to build out Webroot's MSP partner program, expand its solution set, and add more technology partners that integrate the company's threat intelligence into their products.