Cisco, SonicWALL are the Winners in Network Firewalls

Eight brands made it to the elite Users' Choice club this year, and there are two different winners, one for each employee segment. Cisco emerged as the winner in the 100-499 employees segment with the runner-up as WatchGuard. The 500+ employees segment was dominated by SonicWALL, with Cisco as the first runner-up. So Cisco needs to be more aggressive in the market if it wants to dominate in this segment like last year. Other players that made it to the club include McAfee, Checkpoint, Cyberguard, Fortinet and IP Tables.

On the brand loyalty front, 94% of users who currently own Cisco in companies with 100-499 employees said they're likely to buy firewalls from the same brand in the future also. Out of the remaining, 3% indicated plans to move to Watch Guard and 3% weren't sure which brand to switch to. Watch Guard on the other hand enjoyed 100% brand loyalty.

In the 500+ employee segment, SonicWALL and Cisco both enjoyed a whopping 100% brand loyalty. Checkpoint's brand loyalty stood at 89%, but the remaining 11% of its existing users weren't sure which brand to switch to.

No consistent key reason was found for using all firewalls in the Users' Choice club, and it was the same for choosing the brands for future purchases also. This was true in both segments. None of the current as well as prospective owners of Cyberguard,Fortinet and IP Tables firewalls in the 100-499 segment said that they chose/will choose the brand because of after-sales support/service. In the 500+ employees' segment, Fortinet firewalls' current owners said that they did not make the purchase because of after-sales support/service, whereas 100% of the current users of IP tables said that they went for it because of product reliability. In terms of future preferences, 80% of prospective IP tables' users said they are likely to go for it because of product quality, with the remaining 20% attracted by the value for money.