Axiata, Versa Networks to bring SASE to enterprises 

• Collaboration includes Celcom in Malaysia & XL Axiata in Indonesia
• Partnership complements expansion of enterprise offerings

Axiata Group Bhd has announced its partnership with Versa Networks to deliver Secure Access Service Edge (SASE) technology for rapidly digitalising Asian enterprises.

In a statement, the telco said as a Versa Networks ACE partner, Axiata Enterprise, the group’s B2B unit will collaborate with its operating companies, Celcom in Malaysia and XL Axiata in Indonesia, to roll out comprehensive suites of Versa SASE solutions.

It will cover networking, security, and cloud access integration for enterprise customers in the respective markets, it said.

It added that this latest partnership complements the expansion of its existing enterprise offerings in areas of managed connectivity, smart services, cloud, and cyber security. 

Axiata said this also affirms the company’s focus on building best-in-class partnerships to develop and provide cutting-edge solutions across its footprint, whilst also enhancing its talent and capabilities.

Axiata Enterprise’s chief executive officer, Dr. Gopi Kurup, said, “With increasing connectivity, integration and security are critical to ensure uninterrupted business access.

“The Versa SASE innovation integrates security, networking, software-defined wide area networking (SD-WAN), and analytics to deliver scalable, secure, and reliable enterprise-wide networking and security.

“This is done via adoption of a cloud-type gateway which can efficiently distribute and seamlessly offload between the private office network and the Internet to access other cloud services,” said Gopi.

Headquartered in Santa Clara, California, Versa claimed it SASE solutions delivers tightly integrated services via the cloud, on-premises, or a blended combination of both.

This includes secure SD-WAN, next-generation firewall, virtual private network, edge compute protection, secure web gateway, cloud access security broker and zero trust network access, it said.

“This partnership with Versa Networks further cements Axiata Enterprise’s proposition to empower organisations across the region seeking to raise their digitalisation game.

“Our combined strengths in technology, capabilities and reach across emerging Asia markets positions us as the right transformation partner to enterprises that are looking to adopt cloud-based applications and data to accelerate in the post-pandemic recovery phase,” said Gopi.

Working with XL Axiata Business Solutions and Hypernet, PT. Kredit Biro Indonesia Jaya (KBIJ), a leading credit rating and reporting agency in Indonesia, is amongst the early adopters of the SASE solution, Axiata said.

Tony Fallows, vice president, Versa Networks said, "Versa is excited to be working with Axiata to expand Versa SASE further into the ASEAN and South Asia markets.

“Axiata, Celcom, and XL Axiata will soon be able to deliver Versa’s industry-leading fully integrated and feature-complete SASE to support digitalisation in the regional markets.”