Strategic Intelligence: Enterprise Security Software Sector Scorecard Q1 2025 Update

Strategic Intelligence: Enterprise Security Software Sector Scorecard Q1 2025 Update

Summary

The announcement of tariffs on US trading partners will have a significant destabilizing effect on global cybersecurity. Import taxes may result in an increase in nation-state cyber operations and an increase in cybercrime and hacktivism. While there may be a 90-day halt or pause on the imposition of tariffs, that will not change the likely impact on cybersecurity. The bottom line is that any economic downturn will likely result in companies reducing investment in cybersecurity, resulting in higher success rates for cybercriminals. The silver lining for cybersecurity companies is that they may be insulated from the impact of tariffs. In fact, any deterioration in the cyberthreat landscape could increase demand for their products and services.

While many companies worldwide will be concerned about the impact of tariffs on their business, any company that is the current victim of an apparent cyberattack must consider things differently. It must keep a weather eye on the world’s geopolitical picture. However, the reality is that a major cyberattack requires an immediate focus on getting the impacted parts of the business up and running and safeguarding its reputation with customers. That applies to even the world’s familiar brands, such as UK retailer Marks and Spencer. A suspected cyberattack in April 2025 wiped almost GBP700 million ($935 million) off the value of M&S. The signs seem to point towards the impact of a ransomware attack, though the retailer has yet to confirm this. M&S has had to go through the same routine as other victims: report the attack to the UK Information Commissioner’s Office and work with the UK National Cyber Security Centre to respond to the breach and get fully up and running as soon as possible. Resilience is the name of the game.

Scope

• This sector scorecard provides a top-down, comprehensive outlook for the key players in the enterprise security software sector over the next two years, based on the key themes set to transform their industry landscape.

• Companies that invest in the right themes become success stories. Those that miss the important themes in their industry end up as failures.
• GlobalData’s thematic research ecosystem is a single, integrated global research platform that provides an easy-to-use framework for tracking all themes across all companies in all sectors. It has a proven track record of identifying the important themes early, enabling companies to make the right investments ahead of the competition, and secure that all-important competitive advantage.
• At GlobalData, we have developed a unique thematic methodology for ranking all major companies in all major sectors based on their relative strength in the big themes that are impacting their industries.
• Our thematic engine tags over 180 million data items across six alternative data sets—patents, jobs, deals, filings, social media, and news—to themes. The vast datasets within our thematic engine help our analysts to produce sector scorecards that identify the companies best placed to succeed in a future filled with multiple disruptive threats.