Digicel Group through its Digicel Business subsidiary recently acquired the full shareholding of cybersecurity and IT services firm, Symptai Consulting Limited.

This move builds on an initial investment in December 2021 and reflects the group’s ongoing commitment to driving digital transformation across the region.

In an interview with the Jamaica Observer this week, Liam Donnelly, chief business officer at Digicel, said that the growing demand for cybersecurity solutions makes the acquisition perfectly timed, allowing Digicel to augment its services while joining forces with a trusted partner staffed with a highly skilled and professional team.

With Symptai onboarded, the telecommunications company said customers can now expect to benefit from a seamless and strengthened value proposition as well as stronger security solutions that will empower them to thrive in an increasingly digital world.

“We started our investment over four years ago and we have now fully closed the loop to make Symptai a part of the Digicel family. This acquisition will help us to step into the information communication technology (ICT) world especially now when we can’t do anything in technology without looking at cybersecurity, governance, compliance. For us we wanted to work with a company having a great degree of expertise and Symptai’s 27-year track record of excellence and its work with credible institutions across the region made them a natural fit for us,” he further told the BusinessWeek.

CEO of Symptai Consulting Marlon Cooper, in sharing his optimism about the implications of the deal, said that the home-grown entity will now be given greater access to markets and a larger clientèle within the Caribbean.

“Years ago we had a physical office in Trinidad as part of our expansion plans…but as we sought to elevate and to bring speed and pace in getting into more markets in the Caribbean, what made sense for us was to find a company that already has a large customer base in the local market as well as the wider region, and Digicel for us made absolute sense. To top this off, their presence in the cyber space, we think, will also give us access to customers in need of cybersecurity, data privacy and digital transformation services” Cooper said.

While the financial terms of the private transaction remain undisclosed, Donnelly confirmed that Symptai will continue to operate independently and retain its existing staff. “We don’t foresee any changes in that space as we want to continue with Symptai being at the centre of running its own operation, while they continue the work to grow their customer base.”

Digicel currently serves some 10 million consumers and business clients across 25 markets in the Caribbean and Central America. The group in the last few years has been making strategic investments to grow its presence in the corporate sector as it also looks to expand its suite of business solutions.

“Technology is an area that is getting a lot of investments right now especially as governments, large enterprises and even small enterprises all look to integrate more digital services. We therefore see this as a large growth area for our business over the next five years,” Donnelly said.

He pointed to a surge in cyberattacks and the accelerated push towards digital transformation, as signals of untapped opportunity in the Caribbean, for which he believes Symptai is uniquely positioned to respond. In offering specialised insight, research, and training, he said the IT services firm can help regional businesses to grow securely in this rapidly evolving digital landscape.

“Our aim is to get Symptai bigger and more recognised across the region. Our aim is also for them to expand and grow their expertise as they push to become the leader in providing in cybersecurity, compliance and governance. I think they are very well positioned to do so and we will continue to support them with the necessary resources to offset their future expansion,” Donnelly said.

“With our business solutions, Trend Media, and now Symptai all under one umbrella, we are clearly signalling the strategic direction we’re taking to better serve our customers across the region. As we move forward we will also continue to collaborate with our global partners such as Microsoft and Cisco to further develop and strengthen the Caribbean’s digital ecosystem,” he concluded.