Silicon Valley company comes up with hyper convergence tech to counter India’s cyber security woes

Announcing an investment of approximately Rs 140 crore ($20 million) in the Indian market, US-based IT solutions company Array Networks on Monday said that hyperconvergence infrastructure provided feasible answers to tackle the growing cyber security threatS bedevilling Indian government agencies as well as private players in the country.

“The investment will be largely in setting up and running Array Center for Technology Innovation (ACTI) focused on product innovation and design center, as well as augmentation of highly skilled research and technical manpower,” Array Systems announced on Monday.

“Array Networks aims to increase its manpower by 500 per cent by the end of 2019,” the company said in a press statement.

Explaining the hyperconvergence infrastructure technology, Michael Zhao, the President and CEO of California-based company told National Herald, “Through hyper convergence technology, we offer our customers the benefits of both the worlds.”

“While software for different purposes could easily be accessed through subscriptions, the problem arises when you run these softwares on different hardware. We offer everything in one single package,” said the head of Array Networks, which is a major IT partner in some of government’s flagship programmes, including Smart Cities Mission.

“We grew by 40 per cent YoY in 2018, with 60 per cent of its revenues coming from the government,” he said.

Zhao went on to explain that hyper convergence technology provided a marked layer of defence for its customers, to help in warding off malicious cyber-attacks. “This ensures that cyber security remains top-notch,” he added.

“We can tell if the user is a machine. That one particular feature can help defend most of the applications. We don’t let machines access the system,” he said.

Assessing India’s current cyber security preparedness amid a push towards Digital India by the government, Zhao said that India’s cyber defenders were focussed on defending just one component, leaving the other components of the networks vulnerable to cyber-attacks.

“What we are trying to do is giving you a holistic approach,” he said.

The company has also noted that hyper convergence technology was taking over the market at a high pace. “Companies are increasingly embracing hyper-converged infrastructure as a go-to technology platform to address security, productivity and other concerns,” it said.

According to a recent report on cyber security by NITI Aayog, India was among the five countries in the world hit by cyber-crimes. The government think tank report further noted that India had the third highest number of internet users in the world after the USA and China, making cyber security ever more important to government’s overall security strategy.