Following a well-publicised ransomware attack in February 2023, Häfele was able to recover in record time by moving to Cato SASE Cloud. The international manufacturer and supplier of furniture fittings, architectural hardware and lighting products rebuilt its 50+ country, 180-site network in under 30 days.

“When your network is down from a cyberattack, every minute counts, and you can’t afford to bring back a partially secured network. You have one shot to do it right and fast,” said Daniel Feinler, CISO, Häfele. “The deployment speed with Cato SASE Cloud was a game changer. By working with Cato Networks, we were able to bring up the entire network with full security in less than a month. It was so fast that a competing SASE vendor didn’t believe us. Cato made it possible.”

“Agility and security are core requirements for every enterprise, and especially in times of crisis,” says Shlomo Kramer, CEO and co-founder, Cato Networks. “We were happy to support Häfele confront such a challenge, and we appreciate their trust in Cato SASE Cloud as their new global network and security infrastructure. Our teams collaborated efficiently and professionally, setting a world record in a large-scale SASE deployment project.”

Häfele finds the right SASE partner

When Häfele, a German family enterprise based in Nagold, Germany, suffered a severe ransomware attack, it forced the company to shut down its computer systems and disconnect them from the internet. At the time, Häfele was in an RFP process to select a SASE vendor.

“We had finished a proof of concept with Cato and were getting ready to move to the next SASE provider when the ransomware attack occurred,” said Mike Bretz, Global Team Lead of Network, Häfele. Instead, the Häfele team turned back to Cato.

Over the next four weeks, Häfele worked with Cato and restored its IT systems. Häfele installed Cato Sockets, Cato’s Edge SD-WAN device, at 180+ sites across 50+ countries such as Argentina, Finland, Myanmar (Burma), and South Africa.

A global, unified security policy was configured to help prevent another attack, and 8,000 employees regained secured access to the internet and enterprise resources, including 4,000 mobile users who now use Cato Client for ZTNA.

With Cato SASE Cloud, Häfele is now benefiting from a global, unified multilayer security stack that inspects all traffic in all directions from all edges and provides consistent and comprehensive enterprise-grade security. Häfele’s new security from Cato includes FWaaS, SWG, IPS, Next-gen Antimalware, CASB and MDR – all targeted towards preventing future breaches and maintaining an optimal security posture anytime and anywhere.

The rebuilding of the network with Cato SASE Cloud was so fast that it even surprised Häfele. “I did not think that we could shut down, rebuild and transition our IT systems in less than 30 days,” said Bretz. “Cato defied the odds and performed admirably during a challenging time and under immense pressure. Cato did exactly what they said they would do. This is how you earn customer trust.”

“The Häfele project gave us an opportunity to demonstrate the agility and strength of Cato,” said Alon Alter, Chief Business Officer, Cato. “We delivered our hardware everywhere Häfele needed without delay and leveraged our zero-touch provisioning to reconnect locations in hours not days.

“Häfele got back to work faster in part because of Cato, which is exactly what customers should expect from a true SASE platform and provider.”