ESET, the Slovak cybersecurity firm, has expanded its Managed Detection and Response (MDR) services to seven new markets across Asia Pacific, citing a worsening talent shortage and rising threat volumes as the driving factors behind the rollout.

MDR Now Available Across APAC

The expansion brings ESET’s two MDR subscription tiers — ESET PROTECT MDR for small and medium businesses, and ESET PROTECT MDR Ultimate for enterprises — to Hong Kong, Malaysia, New Zealand, the Philippines, South Korea, Taiwan, and Thailand. Both tiers were previously available in Australia, India, and Singapore.

ESET says its MDR service delivers a Mean Time to Respond (MTTR) of six minutes — a figure it describes as the fastest in the industry. By comparison, the median time for organisations to detect a breach stands at 24 days, according to the Verizon 2025 Data Breach Investigations Report.

Addressing the APAC Talent Gap

The launch comes amid persistent pressure on cybersecurity teams across the region. ESET’s own APAC SMB Cybersecurity Report found that 70% of respondents had been targeted by cyberattacks, despite reporting high confidence in their cybersecurity posture. Half of those surveyed cited the lack of a dedicated security team as one of their top three challenges.

APAC also faces the world’s largest shortage of cybersecurity professionals, a gap that MDR services are increasingly being positioned to fill by providing outsourced monitoring, threat hunting, and incident response capabilities.

“Cyber threats are evolving in both speed and sophistication, particularly across highly digitalised economies in APAC. Our AI-powered MDR services bring together automation, human expertise and global threat intelligence to help organisations stay ahead of attacks rather than react to them.” — Parvinder Walia, President of APAC Region, ESET

MSP-Focused Architecture

ESET has also designed its MDR offering for deployment within Managed Service Provider (MSP) environments, allowing a single service to protect both the MSP and its clients simultaneously. The company noted that supply-chain attacks targeting MSP tooling have made the sector an increasingly prominent target for cybercriminals.

Both MDR tiers include premium support packages. ESET PROTECT MDR includes 24/7 prioritised support, while ESET PROTECT MDR Ultimate adds deployment assistance, upgrade services, and regular health checks conducted by ESET engineers.