From reactive defense to proactive protection. As AKD's cloud footprint grew, its security tools grew fragmented, leaving a small IT staff with limited visibility. This customer story shows how the Australian timber supplier consolidated identity, cloud, endpoint, and data protection with Microsoft Defender and Microsoft Entra on Microsoft 365 E5 licensing, raising its Secure Score by 10% in three months. Read the story to learn from AKD's experience and see how we can support similar goals.
Why did AKD decide to unify its security on Microsoft Defender and Entra?
AKD was growing its operations and cloud footprint across Victoria, New South Wales, and Queensland, with more than a thousand employees and a clear goal to become a **data-driven business**. Over time, its security environment had become **fragmented**—different tools were added for specific needs, but they never formed a coherent whole.
This created several issues:
- A **small IT team** was stretched thin managing multiple, disconnected systems.
- Security visibility across **cloud, identity, and endpoints** was limited and inconsistent.
- There was no **round-the-clock monitoring**, which is critical for a business of AKD’s scale.
- Identity had become the new security perimeter, but tools weren’t aligned to that reality.
AKD chose to consolidate on the **Microsoft security platform**—using **Microsoft Defender** and **Microsoft Entra**, enabled by **Microsoft 365 E5 (ME5) licensing**—to:
- Bring **identity, cloud, endpoint, and data protection** into a single, unified platform.
- Align with its existing Microsoft environment (Windows, Office, Azure).
- Gain **24/7 SOC monitoring** through partners, reducing operational strain on the internal team.
- Move from a **reactive** to a **proactive** security posture, with better visibility and automated threat prevention.
By bringing everything into one platform, AKD could simplify operations, reduce risk, and support its broader digital and data ambitions.
What measurable security improvements has AKD seen after moving to Microsoft 365 E5, Defender, and Entra?
After moving from Microsoft 365 E3 to **Microsoft 365 E5** and fully adopting **Microsoft Defender** and **Microsoft Entra**, AKD has seen clear, measurable improvements in its security posture:
- In just **three months**, AKD achieved about a **10-point increase in Microsoft Secure Score**.
- Over the same period, the company recorded approximately a **15% reduction in vulnerabilities**.
These gains came from:
- Centralizing **visibility, tooling, and telemetry** across identity, cloud, endpoints, and data.
- Using **Microsoft Defender** for endpoints, identity, and Office 365 to detect and prevent threats more effectively.
- Leveraging **Microsoft Entra ID P2** to proactively detect, investigate, and automatically remediate sophisticated threats.
- Adding **24/7 SOC monitoring** through partners like eSentire, ensuring continuous coverage that the internal team couldn’t provide alone.
According to AKD’s Technology and Security Architect, this shift has helped the team **get ahead of critical vulnerabilities** instead of constantly trying to catch up. The organization has effectively moved from **reactive incident response** to **proactive threat prevention**, while easing the day-to-day burden on a small IT team.
How did security consolidation support AKD’s broader digital and data strategy?
For AKD, the move to Microsoft 365 E5 and the broader Microsoft security stack was not just a security project—it was a way to **reimagine how the business uses technology and data**.
Key ways the consolidation supported AKD’s digital strategy include:
- Enabling the company’s ambition to become a **data-driven business**, where data informs both strategic and operational decisions.
- Reducing **security silos** so the IT team could spend less time firefighting and more time on higher-value initiatives.
- Unlocking broader access to tools like **Power BI**, which had previously been limited by cost and availability. With E5 licensing, analytics at scale became more accessible across the organization.
- Creating a more **unified, future-ready security posture** that supports new initiatives such as data loss prevention, cloud app security, and governance models for generative AI.
Partners played an important role: **Azured** helped design and deploy the Microsoft cloud and security environment to match AKD’s operational realities, while **eSentire** delivered the 24/7 SOC capability the company needed.
With the Microsoft stack and SOC fully operational, AKD has shifted from reacting to incidents to **anticipating and stopping threats before they arrive**, while also laying the groundwork to reduce reliance on legacy systems and streamline operations further. As AKD’s IT leadership notes, Microsoft 365 E5 and Defender allow the company to **implement what it already has today**, while supporting **ongoing improvement and innovation** into the future.
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