Launch Security rebrands as Defendify

PORTLAND, Maine—Launch Security, a cybersecurity consulting firm started last year by Security Systems News' “20 under 40” winner Rob Simopoulos, announced a name change to Defendify, a move that is in line with the launch of the company's new cybersecurity platform.

Simopoulos told SSN that when he and company partner Andrew Rinaldi started the company 14 months ago, and began helping small businesses and systems integrators make improvements through a cybersecurity program, “we decided to put together a development team and create an all-in-one cybersecurity platform for small businesses.”

The new online platform allows a business to do a self-assessment, build policies and incident-response plans, and train their team with videos and simulations. “We do phishing simulations, for example, to see if their employees will click on links and open files and then train them on what to look out for,” said Simopoulos. “And they can actually deploy technology to protect themselves as well.”

One of the top challenges for business owners when it comes to cybersecurity is “just knowing where they stand,” Simopoulos noted. “So we tried to solve that with our solution, which has a built-in health check-up tool that a business owner can go through and do a cybersecurity assessment of the company, and get a scorecard and recommendations of where they can improve.”

He continued, “We felt that it was important to provide a digitized solution, make it an efficient process and allow our customers to utilize the tool at the pace that they felt would work for them, and it seems to be successful so far.”

The platform has three layers of cybersecurity solutions, with more than 20 services, solutions and tools built inside the platform, Simopoulos noted.

“The platform is modular, so the customer can select what they would like to start out with, such as a small plan to get started, and then begin to grow and add modules into the platform as their budgets grow, or their needs or risks grow inside of the organization, so it is entirely flexible in that way,” he explained.

Another important push for the company is the continued development of its partner program, and Simopoulos said he thinks there is a “tremendous opportunity” for integrators to get into cybersecurity.

“We have had a huge response from security and alarm companies who would like to take the Defendify platform and start reselling it to their customer base,” he said. “And we take them through a full sales and marketing training so that their team understands how to promote Defendify in their business and to their customers. The platform and all the marketing materials are co-branded as well, so it is a really well though out sales training playbook to help them be able to provide those services. For integrators, being able to have that conversation and offer an all-in-one solution opens the door for a great opportunity with those customers.”

Since launching the company, Defendify has grown from two employees to 12, with plans to move into a bigger space in September. “We have grown really quickly and we are hiring a whole bunch more to join the team, so we have had some significant growth,” said Simopoulos. “Our footprint has expanded to well outside of Maine, and we are doing work all over the U.S. at this point in time.”

And with the launch of the new platform and name change to Defendify, he expects that growth to move at an even quicker pace over the next few years.