CrowdStrike brings enterprise-grade AI security to SMBs through Project QuiltWorks expansion

CrowdStrike Expands QuiltWorks Frontier AI Initiative To SMB-Focused Partners: Exclusive

With the expansion of Project QuiltWorks to MSPs and other partners through distribution, CrowdStrike has 'put the partner at the front of the conversation' around risk from AI-powered vulnerability discovery, CrowdStrike's Daniel Danielli tells CRN. CrowdStrike is expanding its frontier AI security initiative, Project QuiltWorks, to a broad set of MSPs and other partners with the aim of democratizing protection against AI-discovered vulnerabilities to the SMB level, the company told CRN exclusively. The move expands Project QuiltWorks to more channel partners through distribution and enables them to take the lead in addressing the surging cyber risk from increased discovery of vulnerabilities and exploits -- as demonstrated by frontier AI models such as Anthropic's Claude Mythos and OpenAI's Daybreak models, according to the company. [Related: Patching Is 'Just Phase One' Of AI's Disruption To Cybersecurity: CrowdStrike's Daniel Bernard] With the QuiltWorks expansion, CrowdStrike can now ultimately bring SMBs access to the same protection against AI-discovered vulnerabilities as large enterprises, according to Daniel Danielli, vice president of global scale partnerships at CrowdStrike. "We wanted to ensure that access to the best cybersecurity technology wasn't just the domain of the largest enterprises who were able to digest the Falcon platform," Danielli said in an interview with CRN. "[It] should mean a lot to the SMB customers, that they're able to stand up to the most sophisticated cyberthreats that exist in the market." Distributors and marketplaces that are part of this latest expansion of QuiltWorks include Pax8, TD Synnex, Arrow Electronics, Ignition Technology, Nord Security, Westcon-Comstor and Zip Security, CrowdStrike announced Thursday. Rather than providing direct access to frontier models, QuiltWorks applies capabilities from Anthropic and OpenAI around the Falcon platform, according to CrowdStrike. That means partners can combine advanced AI-driven vulnerability discovery with their own services such as prioritization and remediation, the company said. The bottom line is that "we're able to democratize the access to CrowdStrike and to the Falcon platform [and provide] the outcomes that all customers needed," Danielli said. "We're able to do that through our incredible ecosystem and bringing in these large aggregators who are servicing thousands of MSPs for us globally." 'Deeply Embedded' In Frontier AI Labs CrowdStrike was an original member of both Anthropic's Project Glasswing and OpenAI's Daybreak Access (formerly Trusted Access for Cyber), which provide access to frontier AI models for vulnerability discovery with the aim of shoring up software against exploitation. For partners that participate in Project QuiltWorks, "what they are doing is working with a partner, in CrowdStrike, who is deeply embedded in both of the frontier AI labs," Danielli said. "We've got the harnesses built within and around the Falcon platform to be able to drive the assessment of vulnerabilities, the assessment of exposure that customers have -- and drive the outcomes in a simple, digestible way," he said. "I think that's the key value for these downmarket MSPs." The process begins with an assessment of a customer's security environment, which partners enrolled in CrowdStrike's Engagement Licensing Program -- or distributors that hold the credentials -- can perform. From there, service providers can address the vulnerabilities identified in the assessment and help customers to harden their software and systems against exploitation by threat actors, according to CrowdStrike. Putting Partners At The Front In April, just weeks after Anthropic disclosed details about its Claude Mythos model, CrowdStrike launched its Project QuiltWorks initiative and has increasingly been expanding it to more partners. With the latest expansion to a wider array of partners including MSPs, "what we've done with the QuiltWorks framework very purposefully is put the partner at the front of the conversation," Danielli said. "This isn't about CrowdStrike leading the conversation. We know that it's not a single technology, a single partner, a single organization that's going to solve this frontier AI problem. We needed to bring the crowd together," he said. "And at the front of that, leading the conversation with customers, is the partner, the managed service provider or the reseller with some services capabilities." Ultimately, to truly protect all organizations against intensifying cyber risk related to the advancement of AI, "we have to leverage the power of the channel, the power of the crowd," Danielli said. What follows is more of CRN's interview with Danielli. How are you expanding QuiltWorks and what does it mean for CrowdStrike channel partners? In this next release, we're expanding the QuiltWorks coalition so that we can reach every customer in every corner of the globe, in every market. And there's a real emphasis on how we go further and further downmarket. It ties in with how we're going to market from a channel standpoint. We can't be in every single one of those conversations ourselves. CrowdStrike would love to replicate ourselves and be in a million different conversations. But the reality is, we have to leverage the power of the channel, the power of the crowd. And so we're doing the same thing here with the coalition. Our entry point into that is to bring the likes of Pax8, Arrow, TD Synnex and Ignition into the coalition. What we've been doing, quietly behind the scenes with them over the last number of quarters, is setting up some new models for us to be able to transact with them, so that they can make the CrowdStrike platform a lot more digestible for SMB customers. We see that route to market coming together through our MSP channel and the small downmarket MSPs. Turning up at XChange Security and hearing from some of these small MSPs, they do need a heightened degree of enterprise-grade security. Because the attacks that they're seeing their customers face now -- with the advent of frontier AI -- are as complex as what a large enterprise is facing. So we're making the platform accessible to those partners through our large distributors and aggregators -- who are buying volumes of Flex pool and then multi-tenanting that out to thousands of small MSPs -- which is making that accessible to millions of small customers across the globe. What should partners know about qualifications for participating in QuiltWorks? There are two things that are important in the QuiltWorks framework. What we've done with the QuiltWorks framework very purposefully is put the partner at the front of the conversation. This isn't about CrowdStrike leading the conversation. We know that it's not a single technology, a single partner, a single organization that's going to solve this frontier AI problem. We needed to bring the crowd together. And at the front of that, leading the conversation with customers, is the partner, the managed service provider or the reseller with some services capabilities. So there's two prerequisites. We need our partners engaged in our ELP program, our Engagement Licensing Program. And that's important because chapter one of the QuiltWorks framework is delivering the assessment, so that we can understand what the customer's state is and what sort of remediation, mitigation and transformation we need to take them through. So the ELP program gives our partners access to the Falcon platform for 60 days and allows them to run templated assessments. We've built a whole battery of these assessments, very focused on the QuiltWorks outcomes that customers are looking for. So the ability to go and drive that is key. If a partner doesn't have an ELP designation, that's fine [because] we've stood up all of our distributors so that they have ELP credentials and capabilities, and they can go and execute these assessments on behalf of the partner. The second thing that I think is important for a partner coming in and wanting to execute is a services capability. Because once we find all of these vulnerabilities through the assessments that we're running, we need to go and drive remediation and mitigation strategies. And that typically boils down to the partner being able to deliver services around this. Frankly, I think this is one of the most exciting opportunities with the Falcon platform. The dollars that a partner could earn today off selling the platform are exceeded by the dollars that they could earn from the services that they deliver. How are partners using the Falcon platform to tackle frontier AI-related risk as part of QuiltWorks? The Falcon platform, which the largest enterprises are using, is where we're building our own harnesses and leveraging that for how we're approaching this complex frontier AI cybersecurity challenge that we have. The downmarket MSPs are essentially leveraging that same platform. What we're doing within the QuiltWorks framework is, we're bringing a greater degree of enablement through the aggregators down to these small MSPs. They've been using legacy technology for a long period of time. And so we've equipped and skilled the aggregators, the distributors with technical resources, with programs like our APEX channel development program. We've equipped them with training and certification access -- so that we can help these small MSPs migrate from the services that they were delivering to customers of legacy AV, legacy SIEM, legacy security technologies -- and actually stitch together solutions. When I spent some time talking with a lot of these downmarket MSPs, they're using dozens of small technologies stitched together, which puts a lot of pressure on the SOCs that these MSPs are running and delivering their services to customers. So being able to consolidate multiple sensors into one, being able to consolidate multiple consoles into one, being able to leverage what we're doing from a cloud security standpoint -- [that] is really helping them accelerate the outcomes that they need most. For partners that are wondering how this helps in terms of leveraging frontier AI models for vulnerability discovery, what can you tell them? It's not really giving them access to the models directly. It's very tightly contained. But what they are doing is working with a partner, in CrowdStrike, who is deeply embedded in both of the frontier AI labs. We were the first partner to be invited into both from a security standpoint. We continue to be actively involved. And we're also expanding our horizons -- like our partnership with Nvidia and some of the work that we do with them -- to ensure that we've got all of the capability. [And] we've got the harnesses built within and around the Falcon platform to be able to drive the assessment of vulnerabilities, the assessment of exposure that customers have -- and drive the outcomes in a simple, digestible way. I think that's the key value for these downmarket MSPs. When they're choosing one of our big QuiltWorks partners to go and buy their CrowdStrike from, they're getting access indirectly to all of that capability. For all the MSPs that are being asked by their customers about these exact questions, how are you providing a way for them to grow their businesses through bringing them into this initiative? I think that's probably the most exciting part of the conversation that we're injected in now. Security isn't just this back-of-office governance, risk and compliance discussion. It's a key enabler of how customers go and enable this capability across organizations. Again, chatting with some of the small managed service providers, they were sharing stories that there are likely to be less guardrails in smaller businesses around how some of these technologies come in and get adopted. They were sharing stories of how some of their small customers were vibe coding and leveraging AI, and getting a tremendous amount of operational benefit. It's driving growth efficiencies across their organization. But they're completely oblivious to the threat vector that it starts to open up and the exposure that they're creating. So on the one hand, you've got this incredibly powerful tool that's creating growth opportunity for organizations. But on the other hand, you're exposing yourself in ways that we've never exposed ourselves before. For a QuiltWorks member through one of our large distributors and aggregators, [the first step is] to take customers through the QuiltWorks framework and shine a spotlight on what it is that they might not see in terms of vulnerabilities across their environment. Chapter two [is], go and deliver remediation and mitigation strategies. And we're constantly building reference architectures and approaches where managed service providers can deliver the outcome through services -- as opposed to a customer having to go and figure all that out. And then finally, the most important part in the QuiltWorks framework is, how do we help customers drive transformation, move off legacy [products], modernize the identity stack, protect the proliferation of these AI agents that are moving across the enterprise with AIDR -- and then finally start to bring in some automation. The automation through Charlotte and AgentWorks doesn't necessarily hit the SMB customer directly. But we're seeing our MSPs take on those toolsets, so that they're starting to drive down their cost of delivering cybersecurity to these customers. So all of these elements coming together through the QuiltWorks framework, for me, unlocks an elevated security posture. But more importantly, it unlocks the ability for these SMBs to go and adopt AI across their enterprise safely, and get all of the strategic benefit that they're looking to get from it. So a major emphasis here is that with CrowdStrike, it's not just the most well-off organizations that will be protected against this new world of attacks, but you're trying to democratize the protection? I was going to go exactly to that word, democratizing. The adversaries are not discriminating anymore. Once it was like, well, I've got to go after the highest target -- a large enterprise, a big bank, a hospital network -- where I can cause mass disruption and extract maximum dollars for my effort. Now, an adversary can just send a swarm of agents out -- and whatever comes back, if they get $10, but they do it a million times, it's a big win for them. So we wanted to ensure that access to the best cybersecurity technology wasn't just the domain of the largest enterprises who were able to digest the Falcon platform. We wanted to make sure that we're able to democratize the access to CrowdStrike and to the Falcon platform [and provide] the outcomes that all customers needed. We're able to do that through our incredible ecosystem and bringing in these large aggregators who are servicing thousands of MSPs for us globally. I think it's a really exciting thing and should mean a lot to the SMB customers, that they're able to stand up to the most sophisticated cyberthreats that exist in the market. In terms of CrowdStrike's efforts around MSP and SMB overall, how does this fit into those and extend those further? We look at all customers through an equal lens. We firmly believe that all customers deserve access to the operating system of cybersecurity, and we want to make sure that it's accessible. We continue to mature how we go to market in these segments, to make sure that the platform is, a) accessible and, b) digestible for SMB customers. What we're seeing is that we had a tremendous uptake in Falcon Go. But again, [with] the sophistication of attacks, SMBs are asking more from us. They're asking more from the expanse of the modules that we have. And so our program is adapting to that. The message out to SMBs is, we're here. There is a partner ecosystem that is ready, willing, able and eager to support you. To the MSPs and resellers who service the SMB market who are not working with CrowdStrike today, talk to us. We've got increased investments in teams who are servicing that segment of the market. For the first time, SMB is an alliances-led sales motion. So for 250 seats and below, we don't have any sales reps covering it. We've got a team of what we call partner account executives that we've stood up globally, because we truly believe that this segment is won and is owned by the channel ecosystem. So we're building programs to support that. We've set up our go-to-market sales teams to support that and make sure that it's an alliance-led sales motion. We've got operational infrastructure that we're putting in place that is bringing automation and self-service capabilities to the table, so that the ecosystem can move at speed in taking the Falcon platform to market. We're excited to continue working with partners on all of these opportunities and make sure that we get Falcon into more hands and more SMBs.

CrowdStrike Expands Project QuiltWorks to SMBs, Extending Frontier AI Risk Protection to Organizations of Every Size

Arrow Electronics, Ignition Technology, Nord Security, Pax8, TD SYNNEX, Westcon-Comstor, and Zip Security bring QuiltWorks down market to SMBs worldwide CrowdStrike is extending Project QuiltWorks to organizations of all sizes. As frontier AI lowers the barrier to sophisticated attacks and collapses the window between vulnerability and exploitation, every organization becomes a target. Through global distributors, cloud marketplaces, and cybersecurity's deepest channel partner ecosystem, CrowdStrike is bringing the only coordinated framework to secure every layer of frontier AI risk to SMBs worldwide. Arrow Electronics, Ignition Technology, Nord Security, Pax8, TD SYNNEX, Westcon-Comstor, and Zip Security bring QuiltWorks down market. Their global partner, MSP, and MSSP networks extend the coalition's AI-driven vulnerability discovery and prioritization, expert-led remediation, and financial protection to organizations that have lacked access to an enterprise-grade program at this scale, while building repeatable, scalable frontier AI businesses on the Falcon® platform. "Frontier AI has fundamentally shifted cybersecurity from risk management to business imperative," said Daniel Bernard, chief business officer, CrowdStrike. "SMBs are the backbone of the global economy and need the same standard of protection as the world's largest enterprises. QuiltWorks has proven itself that standard, attempted by others, replicated by none. The channel is how QuiltWorks can reach every organization, regardless of size, sector, or geography." Bringing QuiltWorks Down Market As more advanced AI models become available, nearly any adversary can discover, chain, and exploit vulnerabilities at machine speed and scale, placing organizations of all sizes at risk. Powered by frontier models from OpenAI and Anthropic, Project QuiltWorks unites CrowdStrike's AI-driven vulnerability discovery and adversary-informed prioritization with remediation services from leading systems integrators, hardened cloud infrastructure from Amazon Web Services (AWS), and financial protection from leaders in the cyber insurance industry. Most SMBs lack the resources and expertise to access and operationalize these capabilities on their own. With the world's leading technology distributors and marketplaces and their global networks of thousands of partners already delivering managed security services to SMBs across regions, QuiltWorks now has a path to every organization, and a proven framework to secure them at the moment frontier AI changed cybersecurity forever. Supporting Partner Quotes "Our channel partners are looking for trusted guidance and confidence as AI rapidly transforms the cybersecurity landscape. Through QuiltWorks, Arrow and CrowdStrike can help connect them with deeper insights into emerging risks, accelerated remediation strategies, and the collective expertise of the industry's leading cybersecurity innovators to better protect the organizations they serve." - Kelly Noland, general manager of cybersecurity solutions, North America, Arrow Electronics "Our partners are always looking for differentiated technologies that address what's next in cybersecurity. QuiltWorks gives them a new opportunity to help SMB customers address frontier AI risk, combining CrowdStrike's innovation with the specialist expertise needed to bring it to market." - Sean Remnant, Chief Strategy Officer, Ignition Technology "Making advanced cybersecurity accessible has always been core to Nord Security. By joining QuiltWorks, we're extending that mission to frontier AI and helping bring enterprise-grade protection to SMBs that often lack the resources and expertise of larger organizations." - Mantas Ulozas, Chief Business Development Officer of B2B Commercial, Nord Security "As advanced attacks become easier to launch and scale, SMBs need access to the same level of protection as enterprise organizations. With the QuiltWorks alliance, CrowdStrike and Pax8 are helping bring enterprise-grade cybersecurity to the SMB market through managed service providers and managed intelligence providers in the trusted channel community, giving businesses the tools, expertise, and guidance they need to stay resilient in the AI era." - Robert Belgrave, Chief Business Officer, Pax8 "Our partners already serve SMBs around the world, putting them on the front lines of how frontier AI is changing cybersecurity. Project QuiltWorks gives them a scalable way to bring advanced protection, expert-led remediation and cyber risk support to customers that may not have the resources to operationalize these capabilities on their own. By combining the Falcon platform with the reach and technical expertise of TD SYNNEX and our partner ecosystem, we can help more organizations improve resilience to those customers while creating a repeatable new growth opportunity for their businesses." - Mike Allers, VP Security, TD SYNNEX North America "The channel has a critical role to play in making advanced cybersecurity accessible to every organization. With QuiltWorks, our partners can bring frontier AI protection to SMB customers while building the expertise and services to help them address this new era of cyber risk." - René Klein, Executive Vice President, Europe, Westcon-Comstor "AI made sophisticated attacks cheap, but sophisticated defense stayed out of reach for companies without a CISO or security team. That's the gap Zip Security was built to close: a fully-managed security platform that deploys, configures, and runs enterprise-grade protection for SMBs. QuiltWorks extends that to frontier AI risk - the same standard the largest enterprises rely on, without added complexity or headcount." - Joshua Zweig, CEO, Zip Security

CrowdStrike expands AI security program to small businesses By Investing.com

AUSTIN, Texas - CrowdStrike (NASDAQ:CRWD) announced today it is expanding its Project QuiltWorks security framework to small and medium-sized businesses through partnerships with seven global distributors and technology providers. The company said Arrow Electronics, Ignition Technology, Nord Security, Pax8, TD SYNNEX, Westcon-Comstor, and Zip Security will distribute the program to SMBs worldwide. Project QuiltWorks combines AI-driven vulnerability discovery, remediation services, cloud infrastructure from Amazon Web Services, and cyber insurance protection. The expansion comes as CrowdStrike aims to address what it describes as increased cybersecurity risks from advanced AI models. The program uses AI models from OpenAI and Anthropic to identify and prioritize vulnerabilities, according to a press release statement. "SMBs are the backbone of the global economy and need the same standard of protection as the world's largest enterprises," said Daniel Bernard, chief business officer at CrowdStrike. The QuiltWorks framework was previously available primarily to larger enterprises. The company said the distribution partnerships will enable managed service providers and managed security service providers to offer the program to smaller organizations that may lack dedicated security teams. The program operates on CrowdStrike's Falcon platform and includes vulnerability assessment, remediation guidance, and financial protection through cyber insurance partners. The distributors will provide the technical expertise and support infrastructure to deliver these services to their SMB customer bases. CrowdStrike said the partners already serve thousands of organizations across multiple regions through their existing networks. The company did not disclose pricing or specific deployment timelines for the expanded program. The announcement reflects CrowdStrike's strategy to broaden its market reach beyond enterprise customers through channel partnerships. The company provides cloud-based cybersecurity services for endpoints, cloud workloads, identity management, and data protection. This article was generated with the support of AI and reviewed by an editor. For more information see our T&C.

CrowdStrike Expands Project QuiltWorks to SMBs Extending Frontier AI Risk Protection

CrowdStrike is extending Project QuiltWorks to organizations of all sizes. As frontier AI lowers the barrier to sophisticated attacks and collapses the window between vulnerability and exploitation, every organization becomes a target. Through global distributors, cloud marketplaces, and cybersecurity?s deepest channel partner ecosystem, CrowdStrike is bringing the only coordinated framework to secure every layer of frontier AI risk to SMBs worldwide. Arrow Electronics, Ignition Technology, Nord Security, Pax8, TD SYNNEX, Westcon-Comstor, and Zip Security bring QuiltWorks down market. Their global partner, MSP, and MSSP networks extend the coalition?s AI-driven vulnerability discovery and prioritization, expert-led remediation, and financial protection to organizations that have lacked access to an enterprise-grade program at this scale, while building repeatable, scalable frontier AI businesses on the Falcon platform. Powered by frontier models from OpenAI and Anthropic, Project QuiltWorks unites CrowdStrike's AI-driven vulnerability discovery and adversary-informed prioritization with remediation services from leading systems integrators, hardened cloud infrastructure from Amazon Web Services (AWS), and financial protection from leaders in the cyber insurance industry. Most SMBs lack the resources and expertise to access and operationalize these capabilities on their own. With the world's leading technology distributors and marketplaces and their global networks of thousands of partners already delivering managed security services to SMBs across regions, QuiltWorks now has a path to every organization, and a proven framework to secure them at the moment frontier AI changed cybersecurity forever.