archTis wins $2.3m data security contract expansion with Department of Defence

Security solutions provider archTis (ASX: AR9) has signed a $2.3 million contract to expand its NC Protect licences for the Australian Department of Defence.

The four-year deal is expected to generate revenue for archTis of $276,000 in the first year, increasing to $463,000 from the second year onwards.

It follows an initial $700,000 services contract awarded by Defence in June and establishes NC Protect as the data-centric security product of choice for the department’s SharePoint on-premises deployments.

Agency pathway

archTis managing director Daniel Lai hopes the contract expansion will provide a pathway for the introduction of NC Protect to other defence and government agencies worldwide.

“This contract […] demonstrates strong growth for NC Protect with a referencable target market client and validates our unique value proposition as the premier data-centric security provider for Microsoft products within the Australian Department of Defence,” he said.

“It places archTis in a strong position for future growth as global defence organisations struggle with the challenge of securely sharing and collaborating on sensitive and classified information.”

Data protection

NC Protect is a real-time, attribute-based data protection and access management solution run on a Microsoft platform that promotes secure information collaboration and sharing between Australian defence agencies and allied partners.

It allows staff to share classified and sensitive documents and use messaging and chat services by applying zero trust enforcement policies to data-centric access controls across tools such as SharePoint 365, Teams, OneDrive, Exchange and Dropbox.

Big data market

archTis made its foray into the $474 billion big data market last month with the launch of a structured data solution that integrates, secures and governs sensitive and classified data from multiple sources at scale and speed.

Known as Trusted Data Integration (TDI), it is expected to help the company service existing and new customers in the defence sector.

“Our defence clients often struggle to integrate and aggregate classified structured data while maintaining strict compliance requirements and tightly controlling access,” Mr Lai said.

“TDI offers a solution for integrating, visualising and securing structured data at scale and is designed to enable secure data fabric-enabled defence and supply chain data services with agility to meet business needs and enable customers to maintain a competitive edge.”