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iOCO adds the Cato SASE Platform to its managed cybersecurity portfolio. This collaboration is an important step in iOCO's managed SASE strategy. iOCO today announced a collaboration with Cato Networks that expands its managed security portfolio with Cato's unified, cloud-native SASE (Secure Access Service Edge) platform. This service addresses the needs of enterprises in South Africa facing rising cyber risk, growing AI adoption, and increasingly complex hybrid and cloud environments. The collaboration builds on iOCO's existing Zero Trust and managed cybersecurity operations for enterprise customers. Through the offering, iOCO will support them with advisory and architectureservices, through migration and integration to security operations and optimisation, so they do not have to build and staff the capability in-house. Cato brings networking and security together in a single cloud-native platform, giving customers unified visibility, context, and control over how AI tools and agents are used, addressing a governance gap that widens as adoption outpaces the controls around it. Gartner named Cato a Leader in its 2026 Magic Quadrant for SASE Platforms for the third consecutive year. The service targets small, medium, and large enterprises with distributed, complex technology environments. That includes organisations with multiple branches or operating locations, geographically dispersed users, hybrid- or multi-cloud infrastructure, remote and mobile workforces, and legacy WAN or MPLS estates. This is the same profile as iOCO's existing cybersecurity client base. "Cato provides capabilities specifically designed for managed SASE and security service partners, including multi-tenant management that allows service providers such as iOCO to manage multiple customer environments efficiently," said Neels Pretorius, Managed Security Executive at iOCO. "Together, Cato and iOCO provide the right technology platform with the resources, operational capability, integration expertise, and customer context required to turn that technology into a managed business service." The managed cybersecurity services model is particularly relevant in a market facing cybersecurity skills and capacity constraints, as cyber risk continues to rise daily. A national cybersecurity survey by the CSIR conducted at the end of the 2023/24 financial year found that 63% of cybersecurity roles were partially or fully unfilled. "South Africa is an important market for us, and working with a provider that already runs security operations at enterprise scale means customers get the architecture and additional operational support and expertise together," said Richard Tsalavoutas, enterprise sales director for Africa at Cato Networks. "iOCO's managed services capability is what helps deliver an outcome for the customer. AI security is now a real customer concern, which is why Cato Networks embeds it in the unified SASE Cloud offering, so enterprises can govern AI use, protect AI applications, and secure agents alongside every other interaction." The collaboration forms part of iOCO's wider plan to expand its managed cybersecurity and network services and comes as the global SASE market grows rapidly. Gartner expects it to exceed US$18 billion in 2026 and to grow at a compound annual rate of 23% between 2025 and 2030, driven by permanent hybrid workforces, accelerated multi-cloud adoption and the need to secure AI access. "This collaboration is an important step in iOCO's managed SASE strategy," said Pretorius. "We are combining the Cato SASE Platform with our security, networking, cloud and service-management capabilities so customers have support from initial architecture and migration through to ongoing operations and optimisation. "Our objective is to align with market demands to enhance our SASE offerings, enabling us to support customers undertaking network and security transformation and those looking for a simpler, cloud-first alternative to traditional WAN and security architectures. "We have also seen a significant improvement in cybersecurity posture maturity for our customers adopting SASE, and we expect Cato Networks' unified approach to accelerate the improvement in cyber-threat and risk management."

Cato Networks launches SMB FlexPool to help MSPs scale managed SASE for small and midsize businesses. 01 Sep, 2026, 15:30 IDT New partner-led pooled-capacity program delivers instant provisioning, flexible licensing, and a high-velocity go-to-market model for Cato's global MSP network TEL AVIV, Israel, Sept. 1, 2026 /PRNewswire/ - Cato Networks, the converged network and security cloud for the AI era, today announced Cato SMB FlexPool, a new program that enables managed service providers (MSPs) to deliver managed SASE services to small and midsize businesses at scale. Built for high-velocity, scalable go-to-market execution and designed for a streamlined customer onboarding experience, Cato SMB FlexPool is designed to remove the friction of a separate licensing transaction for every customer deployment. "We're committed to delivering network services that put customers first, and SMB FlexPool helps us do just that. It offers a more streamlined, scalable, and efficient way to deliver managed SASE to SMB customers," said Art Nichols, chief technology officer at Uniti Solutions. "Instead of managing separate licensing transactions for every new customer, we can provision services in seconds, bring customers online faster, and keep our operations simple as our business expands. This means our customers benefit from faster deployment, a smoother onboarding experience, and the confidence that their secure network services can scale seamlessly alongside their business." Available to Cato's ecosystem of new and existing MSPs and service providers, SMB FlexPool gives partners a committed, partner-level pool of Cato licenses that can be gradually allocated across SMB customers as demand grows. Partners can instantly provision customer accounts, allocate capacity from their pool, and activate Cato services through a self-service workflow, while maintaining full portability of capacity between customers and retaining control of the customer relationship, service packaging, support model, and managed service experience. "MSPs shouldn't have to slow down customer deployments because of licensing and operational overhead," said Karl Soderlund, global channel chief at Cato Networks. "SMB FlexPool aims to remove that friction with instant provisioning and flexible pooled licensing, enabling partners to activate new customers while maintaining full control of the customer experience." Cato SMB FlexPool is designed for telcos and MSPs serving SMB customers, and the program supports the way managed service providers operate across many customers, with repeatable packaging, predictable economics, efficient provisioning, and clear customer ownership. Key capabilities include: * Instant, self-service provisioning: Partners can independently create customer accounts, complete required customer information, allocate licenses, and activate services immediately through a repeatable workflow. * Pooled capacity economics: Partner-level capacity with built-in license portability enables partners to allocate and reallocate capacity across eligible SMB customers as demand evolves, maximizing utilization across their business. * Fast customer onboarding: By eliminating per-customer transaction friction, partners can move from opportunity to customer-ready service in seconds. * Capacity ramp-up: Partners can progressively ramp utilization of their purchased capacity, aligning consumption with staged customer deployments and actual go-to-market progress as their offering, pipeline, and delivery operations scale. * Partner-led service offering: MSPs build and own their customer-facing packages, commercial offer, support model, and managed services, using the underlying capacity to create a proposition that fits their market and go-to-market strategy. Cato SMB FlexPool is powered by the Cato managed SASE (MSASE) Partner Platform, providing a scalable foundation that empowers partners to go to market faster, deliver differentiated services, and operate efficiently at scale. MSASE provides the tools, automation, training, and white-labeled experience that fast-track every step of the partner lifecycle, from onboarding to upsell. Partners can manage SMB FlexPool through the newly launched Cato Networks MSASE dashboard in the Cato MSASE Business Center which gives managed service partners a single, consolidated view of their entire customer portfolio. Partners can manage both SMB and enterprise customers from one platform, with visibility into business accounts, orders, license usage, invoices, and customer lifecycle activity - eliminating the need to switch between multiple tools. This centralized experience streamlines operations, improves oversight, and helps partners deliver more responsive, scalable managed SASE services. About Cato Networks Cato Networks delivers the converged network and security cloud for the AI era. Cato unifies networking, security, and access to provide complete visibility across the enterprise, shared context across users, applications, data, and AI interactions, and unified control to act on that intelligence. Cato combines AI-powered security with autonomous protection to defend against evolving threats, secure AI adoption, and help organizations stay ahead of an increasingly AI-driven threat landscape. Trusted by thousands of organizations worldwide, Cato simplifies operations, strengthens resilience, and accelerates secure innovation. Want to learn why thousands of organizations secure their future with Cato? Visit us at www.catonetworks.com. Media Contact SOURCE Cato Networks

Cato Networks has launched SMB FlexPool, a programme enabling managed service providers to deliver SASE services to small and midsize businesses more efficiently. The offering provides MSPs with a partner-level pool of Cato licences that can be allocated across SMB customers as demand grows. The programme features instant, self-service provisioning, allowing partners to create customer accounts and activate services immediately. Partners maintain full control of customer relationships and service packaging whilst benefiting from flexible licence portability between customers. SMB FlexPool runs on Cato's managed SASE Partner Platform and is accessible through the newly launched MSASE Business Centre dashboard. This centralised interface gives partners consolidated visibility of their entire customer portfolio, including business accounts, orders, licence usage and invoices. The initiative aims to eliminate per-customer licensing friction, enabling faster deployment and smoother onboarding for SMB clients.