Ardalyst, a cybersecurity and digital transformation company based in Annapolis, Md., recently marked the three-year anniversary of the merging of Ardalyst Federal and Celedon Partners.
In summer 2018, Michael Speca and Josh O’Sullivan established a goal to help clients protect and expand their competitive edge to succeed in a highly competitive digital world. To accomplish this, the two founders conceived a three-year strategic plan to accomplish the following milestones:
- Provide digital transformation and cybersecurity consulting services to enterprise entities.
- Build a set of key partnerships that delivered the best capabilities and solutions to the market.
- Develop a managed services capability to help businesses of all sizes develop and mature a cybersecurity program.
- Position Ardalyst to launch a set of products in the market that deliver real solutions for the protection of networks and technology.
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Today Ardalyst enjoys partnerships with some of the biggest names in the industry and a client base that is nationwide. We are following through on those goals and the company mission, and it remains the foundation upon which our strategy, operations and tactical execution is built. By challenging common wisdom, sharing best practices and looking at problems differently, the Ardalyst team helps educate public and private institutions on how best to mature workforces, processes, and technologies to thrive and succeed in this rapidly changing environment.
In three years, Ardalyst has established itself as cybersecurity partner of choice in Department of Defense (DoD), and in the Defense Industrial Base (DIB), while continuing to help government and commercial enterprises execute ambitious digital transformation initiatives.
Ardalyst has also developed solid relationships with key innovators in the cybersecurity space. We are a Microsoft Gold partner, assisting organizations with Microsoft’s rapidly expanding suite of cybersecurity products and their Sovereign Cloud (GCC-High). We also work closely with FireEye and Mandiant, leveraging the industry’s best blend of security tools, nation-state threat intelligence, and cyber defense validation, backed by on-demand incident response services. We partner with Gigamon to assist clients in building more agile networks that can adapt and mature easily over time, and with WitFoo to deliver Big Data security information and event management (SIEM), orchestration and automation.
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Our list of partners is growing, as we expand relationships with iBoss, CoFense and others. “It’s important that we are able to bring together capabilities from best-in-class cybersecurity providers to advance our mission,” said Josh O’Sullivan, CTO and Co-Founder of Ardalyst. “We don’t just re-sell any cybersecurity product. We want to make sure we are working with strong organizations that are committed to advancing the industry.”
Ardalyst has also developed a comprehensive and cost-effective managed service focusing on the DIB, one of sixteen Critical Infrastructure Sectors identified by the Federal Government, which now faces increasing regulatory requirements regarding cybersecurity. “Many DIB firms have been left behind by the cybersecurity industry, as they are small and mid-sized businesses with limited resources. Top-tier cybersecurity products, and consultants, have been focused on large institutions with the funds and staff to implement complex solutions. The shortage of cybersecurity talent in the marketplace exacerbates the problem. Our managed services aim to bring sophisticated capabilities to those customers at a price point they can afford,” said O’Sullivan.
Michael Speca, President and co-founder of Ardalyst, added “one of the big problems that smaller companies face is understanding how cybersecurity plays into their overall business strategy. We talk to people every week that have spent money on a variety of products without really knowing what they want to achieve and how they are going to achieve it. The result is a lot of misdirected funds, and a business that still faces significant risk. That’s why we focus on helping companies develop their entire cybersecurity program – starting from their company’s business strategy – and then develop an approach to their risks that is in harmony with that strategy.”
Obviously there is plenty of work left to do, as the country and the industry continue to evolve in the face of a rapidly changing threat landscape. Ardalyst’s new strategic plan includes further refining our services as well as introducing new products to help businesses develop the resilience to thrive in the face of digital risks. “As I reflect on what we have done and where we are going, I could not possibly be happier about our trajectory,” said Josh O’Sullivan. “Thinking about what the next 5 years is going to look like in the marketplace and where we are positioned…I think it is going to be a fun ride! I am so proud of the people of our company. You are truly Ardalysts. Thank you!”
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A Foundation of Innovation
When we first got started, we knew that the cybersecurity problems we faced as a nation ran deep. Even now, in 2021, organizations are just starting to grasp the enormity of the problem. That’s why our mission is to replace uncertainty with understanding. Leaders in the public and private sector need to tackle their digital risk challenges, not delegate them as a technology problem. You can’t do that if you don’t have a fundamental understanding of the challenge.
We know that to help others understand their cybersecurity challenges, we have to meet them where they are. We have to innovate new solutions to old intractable problems. We have to demonstrate resilience in our own work.
It is the internal culture at Ardalyst that brings the most pride after the steady evolution and maturation of the company in the last three years. We are proud of what we have accomplished, but we have no intention of stopping there. We remain convinced there is substantial opportunity to build on our success in the market and to continue to deliver essential solutions at great value.
We have inculcated a culture of innovation and inclusion at Ardalyst, and our growing team represents the intersection of commercial experience and government service, frontline military cyber warriors and experiences in between. And it guides our recruiting processes as we look forward to the next three years. We are always looking to build the Ardalyst family.
“It’s an exciting time to be involved in cyber security and watching the industry grow,” said Jessica Lawrence, a Navy veteran and senior project manager at the company. “I can’t think of anywhere I’d rather be than Ardalyst, doing important work that really makes a difference. I look forward to seeing how we grow in the future.”
Ardalyst’s name is a mashup of the words “ardent” and “catalyst.” We are passionate change agents who believe in a future where organizations can succeed in the digital world by replacing uncertainty with understanding. We bring decades of experience and expertise in cyber operations, cyber resiliency engineering, and line of business applications and development. There is room on our team for anyone looking to be a part of this special culture.
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Shaping the Future
This year, we are embarking on new and innovative approaches to govern, harden and defend our customers’ networks…and protect our nation’s supply chain. Our Managed Security Services (MSSP), Managed Detection & Response (MDR) and our compliance consulting will be critical in our continued effort to help customers maintain basic compliance and cyber hygiene, develop hardened baseline configurations for IT assets, as well as detect and respond to threats and indicators of compromise.
“As we celebrate our 3rd anniversary as a combined firm, we thank our employees, customers and partners who have helped us deliver cybersecurity solutions during a time in our history where cyber security has never been more important, said Speca. “We look forward to many more years of raising the bar.”
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