Kyocera CISO: Five reasons to consolidate your tech vendors

In 2022, 75% of organisations actively pursued security vendor consolidation strategies, a significant increase from 29% in 2020. Whilst no new data has been released since, the sharp swing in those two years and challenging economic conditions since make it unlikely to have swung back in the other direction.

With this trend gaining traction in the industry, Andrew Smith, CISO for Kyocera Document Solutions UK, has shared his top five reasons for this consolidation.

Reason 1: Vendor management overhead

Smith: “Any increase in vendors brings an additional overhead in managing those vendors from a relationship, legal, compliance and partner operations perspective.

“In many organisations, this type of vendor management is overwhelming, which is why many seek to reduce the number of vendors they deal with in favour of lowering organisational load. However, organisations should know that shortcuts in this area can increase organisational risk.”

Reason 2: Technical complexity

“Having multiple vendors can sometimes lead to increased technical complexity for organisations. This can show itself in networking design/architecture, integrations, and data placement.

“Organisations should consider their technical framework for integrating with vendors and incorporate this into their vendor selection criteria and review.”

Reason 3: Decreased spending power

“When spreading spending across multiple vendors, organisations can often see their spending power decrease. As a result, their ability to request changes and flexibility with a vendor may also be reduced.

“Organisations should consider a vendor's longer-term roadmap and how this meets the business's own goals and requirements, versus asking a vendor to adapt and create a bespoke solution.”

Reason 4: Organisational overhead

“As organisations seek to do more with less, having multiple vendors can sometimes result in overhead in processing orders, paying bills and general interaction with various vendors. Businesses should be aware of the operational load of such an approach, and ways to mitigate this.”

Reason 5: Market visibility

“Having multiple vendors spanning the broadest innovation spectrum sounds like an excellent mitigation approach; however, this relies heavily on an organisation's skillsets and time to understand the landscape of technology and vendors.

“Procurement and visibility of marketplace innovation, especially when it is not the organisation's core business, can be a challenge for any company.”

How to avoid vendor lock-in if you do consolidate

Smith added:“Companies can prepare for vendor lock-in by acknowledging its existence and having clear strategies to ensure that, by design, the business can stand by its goals without compromise.

“Organisations should consider having a broad range of skillsets as part of their risk management processes. This will allow diversity of thinking to challenge the status quo and approach. This risk management structure will best equip a business to ensure visibility and management of vendor lock-in scenarios and their potential risks.

“Organisations should also consider the time and space they allow personnel outside of traditional professional development, to understand the technology landscape. Does the organisation allow attendance to events, webinars, and other educational resources that enhance personnel understanding and thought? This is important if an organisation is to avoid lock-in or have options presented as alternatives.”