MSPmentor

My email inbox today had a Webinar invite from Dell. The company on April 22 plans to educate corporate customers about Everdream, a remote administration and asset management tool for PCs and mobile systems.

Now for the challenge: When Dell acquired Everdream and Silverback in 2007, some managed service providers worried that the PC giant would circumvent partners and market managed services directly to corporate customers.

Memo to Dell: Here’s how to eliminate such fear in your partner base. Read More >

If the managed service market is so darn hot, when can we expect MSP platform providers to begin launching initial public offerings?

I raised that question during an interview with Nimsoft CEO Gary Read on Monday (April 7). While Read can’t speak directly for other MSP platform providers, he certainly has some strong opinions about Nimsoft’s potential path to an IPO. Here’s a sampling of his thoughts. Read More >

A new tool for remotely managing Linux desktops and servers will debut on March 5. At first glance, the tool is for enterprise administrators who want to remotely manage and troubleshoot PCs and servers running Ubuntu Linux. But if you take a closer look, you can imagine the tool — dubbed Landscape — evolving into a potential managed services platform for businesses that embrace open source. Read More >

Competition drives innovation. A case in point: Because the PC market is now wide-open to competition (Windows, Mac OS, Linux), managed service platform providers are working overtime to support customer choice. Kaseya’s latest platform release, for instance, embraces Intel vPro technology and Mac OS X. Going broad with Intel support and deep with Mac OS X support creates some compelling opportunities for MSPs. Here’s why. Read More >

Economic concerns continue in the US, but some clear IT spending trends are beginning to surface. If you look at recent financial results from networking companies, PC companies, software specialists and service providers, you can get a better feel for how to shape your managed services practice for the rest of 2008. Read More >

If you’re still skeptical about managed services and software as a service (SaaS), spend a day at Long Island’s Hofstra University. Roughly 13,000 Hofstra students have access to Google Apps Education Edition to collaborate online, according to Robert W. Juckiewicz, Hofstra’s VP of IT.

The university’s ongoing experience with SaaS — and Hofstra’s future goals — provide some clear hints about how the corporate software market may evolve.

Nobody is predicting the death of Microsoft Office, but it’s clear from case studies like Hofstra that Google Apps and Microsoft’s desktop productivity suite are on a long-term collision course.

Read More >

TelePresence, the next-generation video conferencing technology, is slowly catching on with big customers. But it could be a few more years before TelePresence becomes a mainstream opportunity for managed service providers. First, the good news: Hewlett-Packard says its Halo video conferencing deployments have been doubling annually since the product’s launch in 2005, according to Reuters. And as new TelePresence systems go in, customers will need managed service providers to deliver related bandwidth optimization services.

Now, for the reality check. Read More >

Some pundits say managed services will become a commodity. I disagree. Managed services are not a single technology. Rather, managed service provider (MSP) platforms are a way to continually deliver new solutions to customers.

Think of it this way: As one managed service matures (for instance, managed storage) a new managed service will emerge (for instance, video surveillance). In order to show this visually, let’s take a look at Gartner’s famed Hype Cycle chart.

Now stick with me, and I’l quickly explain how I see the MSP market evolving.

Read More >