Royal Swinkels family brewers on taking a proactive approach to cybersecurity with MDR

Royal Swinkels Family Brewers is a Dutch beer producer with a long tradition of exporting high-quality products to more than 130 countries. With a complex infrastructure that relies not only on IT but also on Operational technology (OT), they needed a reliable partner to take care of monitoring, detections and resolutions to ensure business continuity.

All our customers expect that we deliver on time. So a negative event could mean a disruption in your supply chain.

Robert Heines, the Information Security Manager of Royal Swinkels Family Brewers

THE CYBERSECURITY CHALLENGE

Since Royal Swinkels Family Brewers sell beer in over 130 countries, all their customers expect on-time delivery. So, in that case, an adverse event could mean a disruption in the supply chain and could have a heavy impact on deliveries, costs, etc.

As Robert Heines pointed out, every company of their size relies heavily on IT these days, which means they have to protect themselves against the vulnerabilities that come with it. The solution they came up with is Managed Detection and Response – or MDR. And since they are making beer, they not only have office automation – or IT – but also Operational technology – OT – which sometimes comes with different challenges and discussions about priorities. That is also why Robert Haines likes to compare it to a car’s brake system. The brake does not slow you down, but rather ensures you can drive in a fast way.

The most important ingredient of our beers has always been the passion of our brewers. Nevertheless, making beer these days is also a highly automated process depending on IT.

Robert Heines, Information Security Manager of Royal Swinkels Family Brewers

THE CYBERSECURITY SOLUTION

Relying on a trusted partner to handle monitoring, detections and resolutions was the logical step for business continuity. As a brewery, Royal Swinkels are also extensively dependent on IT. On the one hand, the company is not big enough to have its own SOC. On the other hand, it is not small enough to just wait and see. Avoiding a reactive approach, the company decided to go for a proactive approach. That is why it chose MDR - to delegate cybersecurity management to ESET.

With MDR from ESET stepping in, Royal Swinkels Family Brewers has 24/7 availability of qualified IT security staff filtering alerts and monitoring the environment.

THE RESULT

Joost van Eijsden, Head of Enterprise at ESET Netherlands, explains that since Royal Swinkels has been an ESET client for many years now, it has formed a strategic security partnership along the way, one built on mutual trust. This is one of the key reasons Royal Swinkels chose ESET for the MDR service. Adhering to the same values, such as reliability and stability, naturally makes this cybersecurity partnership successful.

ESET truly has been the right partner for cybersecurity for Royal Swinkels, and we look forward to continuing our partnership. We are sure that with them, our progress is protected.

Robert Heines, Information Security Manager of Royal Swinkels Family Brewers.