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OKTA – Protecting Businesses in the COVID world

OKTA is finally getting more recognised as the clear leader in enterprise identity management and its services are vital to large corporations in the COVID world. As employees work from home, data security from their logins has become a big problem for corporations. OKTA solves this and companies have been turning to OKTA for solutions in droves.

OKTA was founded in 2009, in the golden era of cloud computing, by two former Salesforce employees, Todd McKinnon and Frederic Kerrest. Todd and Frederic noticed that Salesforce customers had trouble with their employees using multiple usernames to access the many different platforms an employee uses these days.

Like all the best business ideas, solving a problem is the quickest way to success so Todd and Frederic left Salesforce to work on a solution to this.

The problem companies had was employees using multiple usernames and passwords to access the different programs they would use. Lost passwords and application lockouts were causing productivity issues and dampening the benefits of the cloud.

Okta software gives employees a single login. In the background, they are automatically logged into their Microsoft Office, Salesforce, Adobe, or any other enterprise accounts. It is seamless and there are no passwords to remember. When they leave the company, their access is automatically revoked.

Most data breaches are the result of weak or stolen login credentials. Okta provides managers with a live dashboard showing who is logged in, and from what location.

Imagine the problems that come with an entire workforce of work-from-home logins. Managers want to know who is working and when and Okta solves this. Security technicians want to know their employee login access is secure and Okta solves this.

Whilst the company was gaining traction before COVID, since the advent of work-from-home the company’s software has become indispensable.

The best news is there really isn’t any other serious competition out there. While Microsoft does have a similar single login, its solution is not vendor neutral, nor does it integrate with as many other platforms.

Business has been booming for Okta. Today their client list is a who’s who of up-and-coming enterprise software companies: Twilio Inc (TWLO), Zoom Video Communications (ZM), ServiceNow (NOW) and Zscaler (ZS) all depend on Okta for identity management.

With big sales like enterprise software, no company wants to be the first. Now Okta has a list of large names adopting its solutions, it will be easier for them to acquire the even bigger names – Adobe (ADBE), Salesforce(CRM) and Major League Baseball are on the horizon.

The business is on a roll. Its stock has risen 89% this year and sales have surged from $86m in 2016 to $586million in 2019, yet management estimates their total market could be $55billion. And check out this strange statistic. Okta net retention rate has been 121%. Usually companies lose some existing customers over time, yet somehow Okta gets its customers to not only stay but spend 20% more than they did last year!

We will find out just how much more they have grown in the last 3 months during the earnings call on August 27th .  Put this one on your Buy list.

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