ANZ web application firewall market forecast to undergo 'substantial' growth

The Australia and New Zealand (ANZ) web application firewall (WAF) solution market is forecast to undergo substantial growth in the coming years, driven by an escalation of sophisticated attacks.

The market trends were analysed for a study period of 2015 to 2021 in a report from Frost - Sullivan, with the base year being 2016 and WAF solutions the key focus area.

The ANZ WAF market registered a whopping year-on year growth rate of 26.8 percent in 2016, as demand for WAF solutions skyrocketed following the rise in malicious attacks on websites and web assets of enterprises across the region.

Frost - Sullivan asserts another driver of the market is the growing adoption of cloud-based WAF services among ANZ enterprises, a lot of which are looking to utilise the security expertise offered by service providers, in addition to the cost savings associated with cloud-based security model.

The vertical segmentation in this study included government, banking, financial services and Insurance (BFSI), service provider, eCommerce retail, manufacturing, education, and other sectors.

There is growth of WAF solutions across the verticals, with the BFSI and eCommerce sectors deemed the key adopters of the technology.

However, there is significant growth in the government and service provider sectors as both verticals continue to invest actively in WAF due to their growing presence in the cyber world.

The study also highlighted the key driving forces behind the growth in the WAF market, which includes; the increasing number of organisations shifting toward the web front and the rising Internet penetration rate; the evolved threat landscape that results in greater concerns over data breaches; stricter requirements for industry compliances and local regulations that drive organisations to invest more in measures for data protection and to avoid potential liability issues; and increasing migration from web application into the cloud observed from organisations.

Some of the most significant vendors mentioned in the WAF market's competitive landscape in ANZ included Akamai, Alibaba Cloud, Barracuda Networks, Citrix Systems, DBApp Security, F5 Networks, Fortinet, Fujitsu, Imperva, JP Secure, KEMP Technology, MonitorApp, NEC, NSFOCUS, Penta Security Systems, Piolink, Qualys, Sangfor, Secure Sky Technologies, Trinity Soft, Venustech Zenedge, among others.