Nivalis Group: Protecting proprietary data with Proton Pass
At a glance
Company Profile: Nivalis Group
Industry: Venture capital | Business consulting | IT infrastructure
Company size: 11-50
Problem: Nivalis Group needed a secure centrally managed security service that allowed them to manage passwords effectively, granting access to the right teams as needed.
Achievement: Admins have high visibility of accounts, passwords and usage, and passwords are being shared securely, leading to Proton Pass being rolled out to all users within Nivalis Group.
Why Proton Pass was the right fit:
Protects proprietary IP and secures business data
Simplifies and improves password management
Streamlines onboarding and offboarding
Nivalis Group is a venture capital firm in the Swiss canton of Fribourg that supports engineering and tech businesses in the region. The group’s goal is to develop its portfolio and help businesses grow through a combination of investment and business support services, such as providing IT support and tools.
"We have a fairly unique approach because we don’t just invest money in companies — we actively support them," said Eric Bertschy, IT Manager at Nivalis Group. "We provide shared services, including finance, HR, and of course IT. The group’s IT department offers solutions for all the subsidiaries and handles ongoing support alongside that."
Eric and his colleagues are responsible for around 130 users, including both employees of the firm and employees of the companies in their investment portfolio. Following a infrastructure renewal, the team was looking for a tool to centralize password storage, streamline access management, and allow admins to manage specific vaults for specific businesses and teams.
"We evaluate several potential solutions," Eric said. "In the end, we went with Proton Pass Essentials. The price was perfectly reasonable, and it offered exactly the features we were looking for. Dark web monitoring for compromised passwords, for example."
"Proton Pass really appealed to us because it offered what we needed to get started at a very reasonable cost. For us, it was truly a quick win to deploy it across the group."
A secure, streamlined approach to password management
Proton Pass could help Nivalis Group create consistency and a single, secure location for business passwords and other data. Storing passwords in multiple unsafe locations presented a threat to data security as well as making work more difficult.
"That led to three main issues. First, security: everyone was saving passwords in their browsers, and we know that’s not secure at all. Second, inventory: we didn’t know who had access to what, which passwords existed, or what access rights were already in place. Just that alone was a problem. And third, having something that would allow a department — or a department head — to share passwords and know which credentials were being used," Eric said.
With Proton Pass, team members can easily access shared vaults managed centrally by the IT team. Password policies can be set to eliminate reused and weak passwords across multiple business networks. Onboarding and offboarding can be managed from the admin panel by the IT team as required, allowing Nivalis Group to prevent data breaches and unauthorized access to its network.
Protect your business with Proton Pass
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Protecting sensitive data
Cybersecurity and data protection were key areas that Nivalis Group aimed to improve within their operations. Eric speaks to the security challenges faced by businesses: "Like everyone else, we’ve definitely noticed that the cyber threat landscape is getting worse." Nivalis Group operates by communicating and collaborating with external businesses, so these interactions can create risk.
Protecting proprietary information is also a key concern. Protecting IP is essential when working with innovative technology, so Eric and his team had to bear this in mind when choosing a password management solution.
Easier onboarding and offboarding
Since Nivalis Group works with a changing group of businesses, onboarding and offboarding need to be simple and effective for IT admins to manage. "In general, when a new company joins, it doesn’t bring many users at first because it’s usually a small company. When one leaves, though, it can be significant — the last one that left, as I mentioned, was around 50 users. We didn’t have that situation directly tied to the password manager."
Now, Proton Pass makes it easy for the IT team and department heads to designate access to shared vaults and ensure that every team has access only to the vaults they need. Eric notes that expectations are clear now that a password management tool is used throughout the group:
"We also insist that shared vaults be managed centrally by IT, to avoid situations where an employee leaves and a shared vault is tied to a deactivated license. Each department head is, in a way, responsible for proper usage, proper distribution of passwords, and for keeping those passwords secure — it’s really about accountability. That’s the message we want to get across."
Success with Proton Pass
Adoption of Proton Pass within Nivalis Group has been easy to oversee from Eric's perspective:
"From a management console perspective, it’s extremely practical. We have very good visibility into users, especially who has accepted invitations and who hasn’t. From an IT admin standpoint, the experience is very user-friendly and works well."
Best practices for password management are also improving throughout the business: "We work very closely with the finance and HR departments. With them, we were really able to teach and guide good practices. The administrative team, including reception staff, is another area where passwords could easily have been lying around, and we were able to make a real difference there."
Ultimately, Proton Pass fits well into Nivalis Group's raft of IT solutions. Eric notes that "there are real, tangible gains. It doesn’t replace governance — you still need clear rules and processes — but once you’ve defined the procedures and work instructions, you at least have the right tool to do things quickly and properly."
If you’re interested in working with Proton Pass, contact our sales team to learn more.