IDC Korea forecasts 12.2% annual growth for the domestic enterprise mobile security software market.
Focus on the growth of related markets, such as MTM, which includes the mobile antivirus and spyware markets.

According to the 'Domestic Enterprise Mobile Security Software Forecast Report 2016-2020' recently published by IDC Korea (CEO Hong Yoo-sook), the domestic enterprise mobile security software market was estimated to be approximately 14 billion won last year. Furthermore, this market is projected to grow at an annual average rate of 12.2% over the next five years, reaching 25 billion won by 2020.

The report predicted that as smart work environments become more widespread, companies will review various mobile security solutions to support enterprise-wide mobile work based on stronger security policies. With the scope of smart device control expanding to include not only PCs, smartphones, and tablets but also recent wearable devices such as smartwatches, the areas requiring management are growing, necessitating enterprise-wide device management. Accordingly, interest in the adoption and application of cloud-based EMM solutions is expected to gradually increase.


▲ Domestic Enterprise Mobile Security Software Market Outlook, 2015-2020 (Unit: Million KRW. Source: IDC, 2016)

In addition, the report pointed out that due to the nature of mobile devices, there is an increasing number of cases where individuals suffer financial damage through various attacks such as pharming, smishing, and ransomware, and that this can lead to secondary damage as it contains personal information such as contacts, text messages, and photos.

As not only personal information but also key corporate data in BYOD environments are exposed to threats of infringement, this is expected to present new business opportunities in the personal security solution market, which has traditionally been dominated by free antivirus software. The growth of related markets, such as Mobile Threat Management (MTM), which includes mobile antivirus and spyware markets, is attracting attention.

Meanwhile, according to the report, security investments by domestic companies and institutions remain passive despite various security incidents. In fact, according to IDC's 2015 survey of the domestic IT security product market, the market decreased by 4.1% last year compared to the previous year.

While the security software market has grown, the growth of the security appliance market has slowed significantly. This is analyzed to be due to the dominance of integrated security application products, rather than applications implementing single security functions, which has impacted market growth in each sector. A similar trend is observed in the enterprise mobile security software market, where the adoption of integrated mobile products is increasing instead of single mobile security products.

Choi Moon-soo, a researcher at IDC Korea, said, “Recently trending technologies such as cloud, IoT, fintech, FIDO, and wearables are all being integrated with mobile security, and as new security investments increase accordingly, the mobile security industry is also expected to grow alongside them.” In addition, stating that "stronger security for mobile applications is required due to changes in the corporate environment caused by BYOD," mobile security solution providers will need to cooperate more closely with mobile manufacturers.