Master MSPs — which offer education and multiple hosted services to VARs and aspiring managed services providers — seem to be evolving in multiple directions. Some are becoming cloud aggregators. Others are expanding their SMB channel training services. But one thing is clear: No two Master MSPs seem to have the same business plan these days. Here’s why.
Rewind to early 2008. At the time, MSPmentor was somewhat guilty of hyping master MSPs. We figured dozens established MSPs would launch Master MSP business practices — training and empowering VARs and resellers to emerge as next-generation MSPs. Fast forward to the present and only a few Master MSPs have built sustainable businesses. Fact is, it’s very expensive and time consuming to recruit, train and convert VARs into MSPs. And in some cases, Master MSPs have had to compete with SaaS services from MSP software vendors.
Overall, the Master MSP market seems to be segmenting. A few areas worth noting:
Established Master MSPs: Companies like Do IT Smarter and Virtual Administrator come to mind. They have have focused heavily on training, educating and supporting emerging MSPs. The companies offer a mix of third-party remote monitoring, management and SaaS applications to those aspiring MSPs. Do IT Smarter was acquired in 2010 but continues to operate under its own brand. Virtual Administrator, meanwhile, recently announced a relationship with MessageWire and is working on multiple new business relationships (stay tuned).
In this space, we’re also watching MSP Services Network and Cloud Services Depot — which also promote NOC, help desk and other services to MSPs. Another crowd worth watching: Cisco solutions providers that potentially offer their NOC services to peer Cisco channel partners.
Distributors: Some critics say distributors aren’t Master MSPs. But I think business units like Ingram Micro Seismic fit the Master MSP definition. Still, the distributor MSP model is evolving. Ingram Micro VP of Managed Services and Cloud Services Renee Bergeron positions Ingram as the leading cloud aggregator for the channel. Meanwhile, Synnex apparently is working on a range of cloud and managed services efforts with companies like Level Platforms, Intronis and Reflexion. And I believe Tech Data is developing a cloud and managed services strategy that may involve a growing relationship with Parallels.
Software Vendors: In some ways, software vendors can be considered Master MSPs. Zenith Infotech, for one, offers remote monitoring software, NOC (network operation center) services and now managed telepresence services (through sister company Vu Telepresence). And in some ways, I guess Kaseya could be considered an emerging master MSP, since the company is building out SaaS services that include remote monitoring, backup, security and perhaps even PSA capabilities for MSPs.
Like I said: It’s getting more difficult to categorize master MSPs since business plans seem to be evolving rapidly. I’ve skipped dozens of potential Master MSP examples in this blog entry. And I wonder: As VARs and MSPs seek more training and cloud services options, which of the Master MSPs will evolve most effectively to meet those needs?
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Posted In: Master MSPs
Tags: Cisco Managed Services | Do IT Smarter | Ingram Micro Cloud | Ingram Micro Seismic | Intronis | Level Platforms | Master Managed Services Provider | Master MSP | Parallels | Reflexion | Renee Bergeron | Synnex | Tech Data | Virtual Administrator | Zenith Infotech
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Hey Joe –
It’s really interesting the way you were able to connect all these dots with a common Master MSP Thread. Who’s to argue? There’s no universally accepted source of definitions for these kinds of things. And, as you have often pointed out, there’s not even a real consensus on the definition of managed services — so why would Master MSP be any easier?
Prior to this blog post, if you were to ask me for a definition of Master MSP, I would have said, “A provider of back-end (read: private label/behind-the-scenes) managed services (you define it) to end-clients of other MSPs.” Not an elegant definition, I admit, but the operative concept here is a multi-level service delivery model.
Autotask was pulled into this arena almost on Day 1, as the early pioneers of the Master MSP business model — nearly everyone you mention in your post above — came to us for help in managing the tracking, documentation, and billing of this complex multi-tier service.
As you can imagine, we had some very significant challenges to overcome to deliver a true multi-tier service business management system that is vendor neutral. But the effort paid off. Most of the Master MSPs as you describe them have already standardized on our platform. And with the fast pace of cloud applications hitting the market, we’re expecting a big expansion in this approach.
I think it is also important to remember that the MSP world still feels like a bit of a exclusive club to most IT companies. It is so hard to find an A-Z model of what a successful MSP actually looks like.
VARs are sitting on the outside looking in and they see all that money just sitting there for the taking, but when they start to get going they get stuck on the details. Ultimately, you are going to see Virtual Administrator (and any other master MSPs who want to remain successful) create a plan for VARs to impliment, and also a community to back that plan up. We’re already well on our way down that road and have a lot more coming in the near future to help MSPs go from nothing, to establishing the processes, technology, and sales tools to actually make an MSP work.
A master MSP can only remain successful as long as the MSPs they service continue to grow. In an ever tightening market I suspect you’re going to see MSPs working with companies like ours thrive as we continue to feed them valuable information and processes they simply cannot find elsewhere.
-Dan
Bob@1, Dan@2: Sorry for belated reply. You both bring up a point that I overlooked… the Master MSPs have already “tested” a range of solutions, eliminating that up-front work for VARs and aspiring MSPs. In theory, Master MSPs can become multi-service utilities for partners that want to pick and choose specific services to activate…
-jp