While the RSA Conference Asia-Pacific and Japan 2015 starts with the keynotes on Wednesday, July 22, there are plenty of events on Tuesday, including the CSA Summit and Innovation Sandbox.
Innovation is a popular word, especially in security circles. Everyone thinks their approach to solving a security problem is the right way to fix the problems plaguing the industry. Who doesn’t want to stand out from the rest of the competition? But it’s an overused word. Innovation is not just about a new product—it implies a new mindset and a disruption to the accepted way of things.
It’s one of those things hard to define, yet RSA Conference’s Innovation Sandbox competition tries to find the most innovative company. Designed to showcase regional innovation, call for entries was earlier this spring and a panel of judges selected a pool of finalists. These companies will have the opportunity to demonstrate their disruptive technologies to the judges and to the audience on stage at RSA Conference APJ in Singapore on Tuesday, June 21.
The four finalists this year are FixNix, Lepide Software, SafeChats, and SODA. FixNix GRC is a SaaS-based GRC solution for small businesses and enterprises for automating audit, risk, policy, incident, and asset workflows. Lepide Software provides auditing, monitoring, and migration solutions for network administration, change auditing, identity access management, data migration and data recovery. SafeChats relies on device-to-device encryption to secure text conversations, calls, and file transfers. Offering tokenization technology for mobile PKI security across mobile apps and payments.
Last Year's Winners
While RSA Conference marked ten years of the competition in RSA Conference USA this year, this year is only the second year the competition has focused on the APJ region. Last year’s winner—the first Innovation Sandbox contest for RSA Conference APJ—was Digify, run by Singapore-based Digify Pte, Ltd. The event format is fairly simple, but still intense. Each finalist gives a three-minute pitch before facing a grueling Q&A session with the panel of judges. Digify founder Augustine Lim and his co-founder Chee-Yuh Loong, knew the competition would be tough but was still surprised at the caliber of other finalists.
Digify helps protect important files from improper copying, printing, and downloading. The Digify user retains control of the file when sent to another recipient, such as tracking who has accessed it as well as un-sharing it afterwards. Think of Digify as a Snapchat for business files, Lim said. Don’t let others screenshot the contents of the file and have the file self-destruct after a certain time. It is useful for sharing confidential documents such as non-disclosure agreements, pitch decks, proposals, due diligence and investor updates, he said.
Winning the RSA Conference Asia-Pacific and Japan 2014 Innovation Sandbox contest and being named The Most Innovative Start Up helped Digify earn credibility across geographies, Lim said. Winning opened doors to get more customers as well as meetings with investors and potential partners, Lim said.
Along with product pitches and demonstrations, there will also be a fireside chat with Yu Chien Siang, a computer security consultant to the Ministry of Home Affairs and a judge for the contest.