- IronTree provides a SecureIT suite including backup, disaster recovery, server hosting, cyber-crime prevention, business continuity planning and legal compliance tools.
- The data management and cloud infrastructure sector faces challenges around privacy regulation, cyber-threats, reliability, cost control as well as innovation in speed, recovery time, and threat detection.
IronTree Internet Services: Company profile and offerings
IronTree Internet Services (Pty) Ltd is a Cape Town-based company founded in 2007. It offers data management services including cloud backup, disaster recovery, specialised server hosting in a private cloud, cyber-crime and ransomware prevention, privacy law compliance management, and business continuity planning. Its SecureIT suite includes products called StoreIT, ProtectIT, HostIT, RecoverIT and ComplyIT.
IronTree emphasises local hosting (i.e. hosted in South Africa), correct pricing and strong support. It works with software vendors such as Sage Pastel, Pilot POS and IQ Retail.
In 2021 Metrofile, a JSE-listed company specialising in document management, agreed to acquire 70% of IronTree with an option to buy the remaining 30% by 2024. The acquisition price for 100% of the company was estimated between R80 million and R140 million. In the year ended 28 February 2021 IronTree reported revenue of about R45.3-million, profit after tax of R6.7-million and net assets of R4.3-million.
Recent innovations and strategic moves by IronTree Internet Services
IronTree has made several strategic partnerships and product innovations. In 2019 it partnered with Rubrik to offer disaster recovery services with near-zero recovery time objectives (RTOs) and full DR server infrastructure aimed at medium to large enterprises in southern Africa.
It also set up a channel partnership with POPIA365 in 2020 to guide its clients in meeting the rules of the Protection of Personal Information Act (POPIA), which is the main privacy law in South Africa and shares some similarities with Europe’s GDPR. In 2022, IronTree built a new partnership with Sendmarc to block e-mail impersonation and phishing. The service makes use of domain-based message authentication, reporting and conformance (DMARC) to give stronger protection against fraud.
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Industry context, challenges and innovations
The data management, cloud infrastructure and cyber-security sector in South Africa and worldwide is under the constant strain to deliver resilience, speed, security and compliance. Companies rely more on thecloud backup and disaster recovery because ransomware and other cyber threats are rising fast. Privacy laws such as POPIA add further pressure since they require firms to keep personal data secure and report the breach without delay.
Challenges include ensuring recoverability (how fast systems can be restored), security (protecting against malware, ransomware, phishing, impersonation), data sovereignty (hosting data locally to comply with local laws), cost control(cloud storage, bandwidth, licensing), and complexity of compliance (regulations, audits, privacy laws). Also maintaining the reliability and system uptime under increasing the cyber threats and infrastructure demands is difficult.
