MSPmentor

Open source is starting to influence portions of the managed services market. But can MSPs really trust open source?

DirectPointe — the top ranked company on our MSPmentor 100 list for 2007-2008 — built its entire business on open source. And scores of MSPs have embraced Untangle’s open source security solutions. Now, I’m starting to wonder if Zenoss Inc. — an open source network monitoring specialist — will make a more aggressive move into the MSP industry.

Despite those milestones, I sense that open source hasn’t gained critical mass yet with most MSPs.

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I’m not suggesting managed service providers are immune to the economic turmoil, but here’s a piece of good news all MSPs should note: DirectPointe, ranked No. 1 on last year’s MSPmentor 100 list, announced record-setting revenue for its third quarter. How does that compare with other MSPs? Here’s the scoop.

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In the 1990s, long distance phone companies wanted to offer “last mile” local phone services. Now, a similar trend is emerging in the managed services market — where regional and even national MSPs want to offer personalized, local, on-site services.

Enter OnForce, the online market place where IT service providers can hire one another to manage specific technology projects. Anecdotal evidence suggests that a growing number of MSPs are leveraging the OnForce market place to outsource contract work to solutions providers.

Just ask DirectPointe, the top-ranked company on our 2008 MSPmentor 100 list.

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We were meeting for breakfast, but Autotask CEO Bob Godgart wasn’t ready to pick up his fork. Instead, he opened his HP notebook and walked me through his vision for multi-partner customer engagements. Everyone from ConnectWise to OnForce (and soon, Partnerpedia) has communities to help VARs and managed service providers outsource work to one another. But I could tell Godgart has something different in mind. So we pushed aside breakfast, and dove into conversation.

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