Cybersecurity solutions provider Kudelski Security has entered a strategic partnership with smart contracts auditing firm Hosho in order to provide greater security for blockchain ecosystems. The news was announced in a press release from Kudelski on March 19.

As Cointelegraph auf Deutsch previously reported, Kudelski Security — a Swiss-born, stalwart tech security solutions provider whose multinational operations run from locations across Europe and the United States — launched a Blockchain Security Center (BSC) this January.

Kudelski, which has expertise in the field of applied cryptography, says it established the partnership with Las Vegas-based Hosho in order to extend the capabilities of the BSC and combine the companies’ respective skill sets. The goal of the partnership is to provide more robust security solutions to enterprises and public sector organizations that use blockchain technology.

The press release cites research from Hosho that claims that over $2 billion was lost or stolen from blockchain companies in 2018 due to security vulnerabilities. Hosho’s auditing of the smart contract sector has purportedly found that over one in four have “critical vulnerabilities and three in five have at least one security issue.”

Kudelski states that the combined resources of the new partnership will allow a wide gamut of entities to design, build and operate secure blockchain applications and ultimately realize greater value from their investments, with lesser risk.

Hartej Sawhney, co-founder and president of Hosho, has given a statement claiming that:

“It [the partnership] is the first time a blockchain cybersecurity leader has joined forces with a publicly traded cybersecurity company. Enterprises are rapidly investing into incorporating decentralized ledger technologies into their legacy systems. Companies such as Kudelski, with 30 plus years of experience in cybersecurity, IoT, and public access solutions, are needed to meet the [ sector’s] increasingly complex demands.”

As reported, Hosho was recently prompted to lay off 80 percent of its staff, claiming that the increased use of automated tooling made auditing work from a large number of engineers unnecessary. Sawhney told Cointelegraph at the time that a downturn in the number of smart contracts audits amid the protracted crypto bear market was another key factor in the move.