Sectigo targets ANZ growth as certificate lifespans shrink

Sectigo is expanding its presence in Australia and New Zealand as shorter digital certificate validity periods increase pressure on organisations to automate certificate management and reduce cybersecurity risks.

The company is investing in local sales and channel expertise to capitalise on growing demand for certificate lifecycle management (CLM), which helps organisations monitor, manage and renew digital certificates across their IT environments.

Jairo Fraile, VP of Global Partner Sales at Sectigo, said the ANZ market is demonstrating increasing maturity in adoption of automated certificate management, creating opportunities for the company to expand its customer base.

Sectigo has been encouraged by the willingness of local organisations to adopt more efficient approaches to certificate management, particularly as shorter validity periods increase the administrative burden associated with maintaining digital trust.

Shorter lifespans increase pressure

Digital certificates play an important role in establishing trust between systems, authenticating identities and supporting encrypted communications.

However, changes to certificate validity requirements are forcing organisations to review how they issue, monitor and renew certificates.

Fraile said the period for which public digital certificates remain valid had already fallen from one year to 200 days, with further reductions expected, increasing the frequency with which organisations must renew certificates to maintain secure connections and avoid service disruptions.

For businesses managing certificates manually, the changes can create substantial operational challenges, particularly where certificates are distributed across large and complex IT environments.

Organisations must maintain visibility over their certificate inventories, track expiry dates and ensure renewals occur before certificates become invalid.

Failing to manage certificates effectively can introduce security risks and disrupt services that depend on them.

Sectigo is positioning its CLM platform as a way to address these challenges by automating certificate management while providing organisations with greater visibility, reporting and control.

The platform is designed to manage different types of certificates across public-facing and private environments.

Fraile said the combination of shorter certificate lifespans and growing certificate volumes was increasing demand for tools that could reduce the reliance on manual processes.

"Certificate lifecycle management mainly solves two things: risk and cost," he said.

"Doing it manually is risky. It's expensive and it isn't reliable."

AI adds to certificate management demands

The growing adoption of artificial intelligence is creating another source of demand for digital certificates, particularly as companies implement AI agents that interact with applications, services and other machines.

Agentic AI is contributing to the growing need for machine identities, which must be authenticated and managed as organisations deploy increasingly autonomous systems.

As the number of machine identities increases, so too does the volume of digital certificates that organisations need to oversee.

"The growth of digital certificates, and therefore the volume of digital certificates to be managed, is not going to stop," Fraile said. "It's going to keep growing."

Sectigo has adopted AI internally and has begun incorporating AI-driven capabilities into its products to improve usability.

The company has introduced a connector that allows users to query certificate information through various AI tools using natural language.

This enables customers to ask questions about the status of their certificate environments and retrieve information and reports without relying exclusively on traditional interfaces.

The capability is intended to simplify access to certificate management information while complementing the platform's existing integrations.

However, Fraile clarified AI will not eliminate the need for human involvement in every aspect of digital trust.

Certain validation processes still require people, even where technology can assist with the surrounding work.

"We can optimise, but there are some things that still need to be validated by people, not just by AI," he said.

Post-quantum security set to drive demand 

Beyond certificate lifecycle management and AI adoption, Sectigo has identified preparations for post-quantum cryptography as another potential driver of demand.

The emergence of quantum computing is prompting businesses and technology providers to prepare for changes to existing encryption algorithms, with organisations needing to understand how future cryptographic transitions could affect their systems.

Fraile said organisations would need appropriate tools to manage these changes, including the certificates and encryption technologies involved.

He also pointed to crypto agility - the ability to change cryptographic algorithms and technologies as requirements evolve - as an important consideration.

Sectigo is involved in the development of relevant standards, and expects the transition to create additional opportunities for its certificate management offering.

Organisations will require platforms capable of managing certificates at scale as encryption technologies evolve.

The 2026 Sectigo State of Crypto Agility report found that just 38 per cent of businesses surveyed had completed a full assessment of systems vunerable to quantum computing attacks, though this was up from only 14 per cent in 2025.

Seventy-eight per cent of respondents believe that their existing public key infrastructure will need to change to a great or very great extent to support post-quantum cryptography.

For businesses already struggling with manual certificate administration, the prospect of further changes reinforces the need to establish a more structured approach.

Fraile said Sectigo's focus was on making complex processes as straightforward as possible for customers.

"The goal is not to make it more complex or make it more sophisticated. It needs to be as simple as possible," he said.

Sectigo identifies ANZ as potential growth market

Sectigo's investment in Australia and New Zealand reflects its view that certificate management requirements are becoming increasingly important across global markets.

In markets where labour costs are lower, organisations might have less immediate financial incentive to automate manual processes. However, Fraile said the security risks associated with inadequate certificate management remained relevant regardless of labour costs.

Fraile described ANZ as increasingly receptive to solutions that could reduce operational costs and security risks.

Sectigo already has established customers in the region, including significant organisations, but expects its presence to grow as more businesses adopt automated approaches.

He attributed part of the opportunity to the company's investment in local personnel, which he said would help it engage more closely with partners and customers.

Sectigo is relying on its channel ecosystem to support that expansion, with local salespeople and channel sales engineers helping communicate the benefits of certificate management automation.

Fraile said the company expects significant growth across ANZ as businesses increasingly recognise the need to manage digital certificates securely and at scale.