[ISN] SSL VPNs Will Grow 54% A Year, Become Defacto Access Standard: Report

[InfoSec News]

http://www.informationweek.com/story/showArticle.jhtml;jsessionid=NIOHIDQYVVDQSQSNDBESKHA?articleID=56900844

By Matthew Friedman 
Networking Pipeline 
Jan. 5, 2005 

Spending on Secure Sockets Layer Virtual Private Networks (SSL VPN)  
will grow at a 53% compound annual growth rate, and SSL VPNs will
surpass traditional IPsec VPNs as the de-facto remote access security
standard by 2008, according to a new report from Forrester Research.

In "SSL VPNs Poised for Significant Growth," Forrester associate
analyst Robert Whiteley says companies are attracted by the
technology's application-level simplicity. Unlike IPsec VPNs, which
require special client software to access the network, SSL VPN
supports a wide range of devices, from desktop computers to PDAs, and
applications, while offering network administrators greater
granularity of user information and providing better endpoint
security.

According to the report, some 44% of American businesses have deployed
SSL VPNs, spending $97 million on the technology last year alone.  
Despite the impressive adoption rate for a technology that has been in
the business mainstream for less than a year, Forrester expects SSL
VPN deployments to continue to take off, with the market growing at a
53% compound annual growth rate to $1.2 billion in 2004.

SSL VPNs are already well-entrenched in the financial and business
services industries and in the public sector. Driven by the need to
ensure endpoint security for online services, the financial services
industry can boast a 56% penetration rate, with business services just
behind at 51%. In both cases, Whiteley predicts a compound annual
growth of 34% to 2010 which, though impressive, pales beside the
expected SSL VPN growth in late-adopting industries.

Indeed, Whiteley writes that retail and manufacturing are poised to
leap into SSL VPN with gusto over the next few years. "Retail and
wholesale allocates 7.8% of its IT spend to security — more than even
financial services," he notes. "This vertical shows the most SSL VPN
potential because of its eye toward security, relatively little
penetration to date, and the need for large, distributed deployments —
resulting in 82% annual market growth through 2010."

Though only 29% of manufacturers are currently invested in SSL VPNs,
Whitely expects that to change dramatically through 2010, predicting a
phenomenal 94% compound annual growth rate. IPSec was a poor fit for
this vertical's needs, Whiteley observes, but the application-layer
flexibility of SSL VPNs should spur rapid adoption. "Manufacturing
companies typically don't provide employees with corporate-managed
laptops," he writes. "Thus, SSL VPNs allows a 'bring-your-own
computer' model where manufacturing companies still control security
and user policy but don't have to incur the cost of unnecessary IT
infrastructure."