Cato Networks commissioned Forrester Consulting to conduct a Total Economic Impact™ (TEI) study and examine the potential return on investment (ROI) enterprises may realize by deploying Cato SASE Platform.¹ This abstract will focus on use of the multiple security capabilities within Cato SASE Platform and the security posture improvements, licensing savings, and labor productivity that these security capabilities provide to organizations.

The TEI case study explores the experiences of six organizations that implemented Cato SASE, described by these interviewees:

• CIO of a global chemicals company with $2.5 billion in annual revenue.

• Director of a global real estate services company with $5 billion in annual revenue.

• IT and security officer of a US-based physical therapy and rehabilitation services company with $1 billion in annual revenue.

• Enterprise technology director of a global ingredients company with $5 billion in annual revenue.

• Infrastructure and platform manager of a global manufacturing company with $10 billion in annual revenue.

• Director of a global nutrition and personal care company with $5 billion in annual revenue.

The Cato SASE Platform (Cato SASE) delivers a SASE cloud platform that provides converged network and security capabilities that improve network performance and reduce security risk. This cloud-native platform provides a single user interface that saves network and security teams’ time, improves the support of mobile and remote workers, and is easy to implement. Consolidating software-defined wide-area network (SD-WAN), secure web gateway (SWG), cloud access security blocker (CASB), Zero Trust network access (ZTNA), and next-generation firewalls (NGFWs) into a single tool eliminates the need for multiple tools and leads to labor savings.

Investment Drivers

The interviewees’ organizations adopted Cato SASE Platform to reduce security risks, network issues, and costs; provide labor efficiencies; and improve remote and mobile worker support. These organizations struggled with several challenges in their legacy environments, including:

• Disparate cybersecurity solutions leading to unnecessary cybersecurity risk. Interviewees shared that security concerns were part of their organizations’ motivation that led to the move to Cato. Cybersecurity threats, incident close calls, and actual incidents were all described, with noise from false positives, delays in issue identification, inefficiencies and errors due to the use of multiple tools, and lack of automated responses all playing a role in heightened risk.

• Lack of automation, lack of integration, and capability gaps of cybersecurity solutions leading to labor inefficiencies. Interviewees described numerous shortcomings of existing tools related to policy setting, administration, monitoring, and response capabilities. Significant duplication of effort resulted from having disparate solutions without effective integration. Capability gaps, including lack of automation, led to additional work at every phase of security processes.

• Missed opportunities for labor efficiencies and network and security team collaboration. Interviewees’ organizations described wanting a single network and security management solution which would improve network visibility, network administration, security management, and outcomes. Interviewees expected collaboration improvements between network and security teams, and likely labor efficiencies through common training, visibility, and support of common responsibilities.

• Improved user experience and reduced risk for remote and mobile workers. Interviewees wanted to improve the experience of remote and mobile workers while providing better security and utilizing better ZTNA and CASB capabilities.

Security Team Benefits Of Moving To Cato SASE

The interviewees’ organizations chose to invest in Cato SASE Platform for the following reasons:

• An improved security posture. Cato SASE provided interviewees’ organizations with an improved security posture by delivering highly effective cybersecurity capabilities on a single platform. Interviewees described improved prevention capabilities and monitoring that identified threats sooner, with effective alerts and automated actions enabling their security teams to respond faster and more effectively to identified threats. The real estate service company’s director shared, “Cato improves our security posture considerably.”

• A single user interface with automation and improved security features. Interviewees shared that their organizations’ security teams no longer had to perform repetitive actions across multiple solutions, which previously included administrative tasks, monitoring, and responding to security incidents. Interviewees described automated actions to identify threats that met a risk threshold, leading to device isolation and immediate notification to the local IT team for effective response. Improved security features improved prevention, monitoring, and response. The manufacturer’s infrastructure and platform manager shared, “Cato removes 80% to 90% of the false positives.”

• A single network and cybersecurity solution. Interviewees shared that the benefits of having a single network and security solution exceeded their expectations. Beyond additional cost savings, there were synergies from improved network and security team collaboration and shared responsibilities. The chemical company’s CIO said, “Both groups are now more aware of each other because everything’s in the same pane of glass.”

Key Results

The results of the investment for the interviewees’ organizations include:

• Reduced exposure to breach costs of 70% for attacks addressable with Cato SASE’s security components. Cato SASE provides the interviewees’ organizations with an improved security posture by providing highly effective cybersecurity capabilities on a single platform. Their organizations saw improved prevention capabilities, monitoring that identified threats sooner with effective alerts and automated actions, and faster and more effective responses to identified threats. The physical therapy and rehabilitation service’s IT and security officer noted a marked improvement in their organization’s security posture: “We’ve reduced its cyber exposure, and that’s a percentage of annual revenue. We were probably about a 1.5 [percent of revenue] before Cato. ... Now it’s about a 2.2, and we expect to get to 2.6.”

• Improved cybersecurity labor productivity by 20%. Interviewees shared that Cato SASE has provided time savings for every phase of their security teams’ workloads. The real estate services company’s director provided an example of the labor reduction from having a single platform, “We’re saving significant labor by not having to manage hundreds of the firewalls.” Interviewees shared that Cato SASE prevented incidents. However, if an incident occurred, it was identified earlier, often resolved automatically, and required less resolution effort than before due to the early identification, single UI, and better incident information.

• Security feature licensing savings. Interviewees shared that the cost of the Cato SASE security components was significant. The chemicals CIO shared, “The Cato firewall is about a third of what we previously paid.”