375 RSAC Vendor Exhibitors

Down 6% from 2023

At IT-Harvest we track which vendors exhibit at the major conferences. Along the way we learned that the list of exhibitors on a conference site is very fluid. There are late additions (like IT-Harvest. We were too late to even be listed. See us at Booth #4309 North!) And there are withdrawals. Last year Rapid7, Ping Identity, BlueVoyant, One Identity, and Red Sift were no-shows. This year there are 30 vendors that are no longer listed as exhibiting.

With those 30 withdrawals there are only 375 cybersecurity vendors exhibiting at RSAC 2024, down from 401 last year. Note that IT-Harvest only tracks cybersecurity product vendors, so consultants, resellers, distributors, the NSA, and the FBI are not included in these numbers, although they are all exhibiting.

Here is a partial view of the vendors that have pulled out. Note there is always an explanation, usually a good one. If, for instance, a company is planning a reduction in force they may want to avoid the optics of doing that right after a big expenditure for a conference. Talon has been acquired by Palo Alto Networks for instance.

Thanks to our advisor, Jeff Kushner, you can see the entire Google Sheet of all 405 exibitors here with their booth locations. If you want to dig into IT-Harvest data on any of these vendors just go to dashboard.it-harvest.com/rsac and sign up for free access through May 10.

There are two companies exhibiting this year that are over 100 years old.

The vendors exhibiting this year have taken in an astounding total of $54.6 billion.

Back to the no-shows. The big surprise to me is that three of the top ten API Security vendors (by head count) have pulled out of RSAC this year. Noname, Salt Security, and Bionic. Three years ago API security was the fastest growing of the 17 high level categories that we track. This sector has suffered from the overall pullback in security spending. I believe that will come roaring back with the next major breach due to insecure APIs. When looking at the below head count numbers always keep in mind that because of its horrible choice of names, Noname has hundreds of accounts on Linkedin that claim to be employed by them.

The other five API security vendors stand to benefit by the absence of the two largest, and best funded, vendors in the API security space. The other categories are:

One last thing to check. Who is conspicuously missing from the Expo floor this year? Palo Alto Networks! This is a dramatic shift for a vendor that has always had an impressive presence at RSAC. The decision was made months ago because it does not look like they pulled out recently. A quick check of their posts on LinkedIn reveals an absence of conference promotions. The absence of the biggest cybersecurity vendor from the biggest cybersecurity conference is going to be felt next week. Meanwhile, the other big competitors for the hearts and minds of CISOs will be there in force: Fortinet, Zscaler, Cato Networks, Check Point, and Netskope. Crowdstrike has a booth in both the North and South Expo halls.

Despite the reduced number of exhibitors the buzz at RSAC is alive and well. While 2023 was a challenging year for the industry, 2024 is seeing an uptick in new investments and some disruptive acquisitions. There is no doubt that the theme of this year’s event will be AI, both the possibilities for new ways to defend our systems and for new methods the attackers can think up.

Drop by our booth (#4309) and chat about any of the trends you see. Get a demo of the Dashboard and get a signed copy of Security Yearbook.