The quality of people visiting stands at RSA 2010 has improved markedly, according to those manning the stands.

"It's a lot better this year," Chester Wisniewski, senior security adviser to Sophos told V3.co.uk.

"Last year we got about a third of people on the stand trying to sell us their companies. They'd lost angel funding and were just like 'Would you be interested in a company that does xyz?' Possibly, but we're here to sell, not to buy.

"This year there's a lot more customer engagement, we're doing a lot of good business."

Although visitor numbers won't be released for some weeks the exhibition hall has been packed and companies are reporting a significant amount of new business. Visitor numbers fell sharply last year as companies cut back on spending but anecdotal evidence from the show floor indicates this may be easing up.

"We're getting far more done here now," said Tom Murphy, chief strategy officer at enterprise application whitelisting vendor Bit 9.

"There's a lot of people interested in the concepts we're pushing and the quality of visitors is high."

05 Mar 2010