So, it’s officially 2015 and we are now ready to begin a new year with new opportunities. What will those opportunities look like? Will we have challenges to face in 2015? Let’s examine some predictions about what we should expect in the coming year.
Security
2014 taught us a lot about security and how important it is. In 2015, security will spill over into the end-user community as more non-technical users will be aware of security and how vulnerable they are to cyber attacks and other threats. 2015 should be a year of education and action. MSPs should see vastly different opportunities to deliver security solutions to customers who may have previously thought security was an afterthought.
Show us your credentials
We’ve been saying this for a long time but 2015 could be the year that changes everything when it comes to certifications. As customers become more aware of how MSPs and cloud providers are integral to successful IT operations, providers will need to be ready to provide essential “proof” that they are a) technically proficient and capable of delivering the solutions, b) trustworthy to take on the responsibility of managing IT for the customer, and c) a health corporate entity, so that the customer will know the MSP is financially sound and will be available to deliver their solutions.
The days of just saying you can handle work are now officially gone. MSPs need to prove their capabilities. Tools like the MSP/Cloud Verify Program will lead the way for helping MSPs demonstrate their capabilities to customers.
Print Invasion
No, managed print isn’t going to make a sudden comeback in 2015. However, MSPs may be seeing competition from a new group this year…office supply stores. Despite Staples and Best Buy selling their managed services divisions in 2014, many office supply companies are looking to get into managed services in a big way, and buying their way into the profession is looking like the best and fastest method.
These office supply companies are fitting into an eerily familiar pattern; they’ve been in business for a few decades, they are well run businesses, they have a large and diverse customer base, and they have little IT management capabilities to offer. In 2000, VARs underwent a massive migration towards managed services where we saw many of them experience difficulties with the business management of a managed services practice. Most of the last decade was spent helping VARs who became MSPs deal with the business issues they were facing, not the technical issues.
The office supply companies face the opposite problem. While they have plenty of business experience, these companies have relatively little IT management skill. Buying an existing MSP practice can be a very efficient way to quickly enter the managed services profession.
The Year of Private Cloud, Finally
Until now, all the cloud discussion has been around public cloud. But, the real money is still in private cloud. The trouble is smaller MSPs haven’t really seen the benefits of developing private/hybrid cloud solutions. 2015 could change everything related to private cloud.
Companies like HP, Lenovo, and even some of the distributors like Arrow, Avnet, Ingram Micro, and others, are poised to develop new technology and financing programs this year to help MSPs acquire and deploy private and hybrid cloud solutions. For private cloud, financial accessibility remains the biggest barrier to entry.
Vendor Shakeup
A number of RMM companies have already been acquired or had significant investor changes, but could this M&A wave hit other channel vendors in 2015? The backup, PSA, and security vendors may be particularly susceptible to M&A activity this year, and for a number of reasons.
The security and backup vendors are plentiful, so the need for consolidation in these two spaces is significant. The PSA vendors may also be an interesting space to watch, not for consolidation per se, but for other reasons. Autotask, for example, recently purchased a small RMM company in an attempt to expand its service capabilities. ConnectWise has long had a close relationship with it’s RMM spinoff LabTech. But, is this what MSPs really want? We will see. Innovation, in all these vendor segments, must exist or the individual companies will begin to see stagnation, and that leads to acquisitions.
MSP/Cloud Spending Growth
We haven’t seen what the analysts are predicting for 2015 yet but my guess is IT spending, even if it is growing minimally, will experience growth this year. More importantly, however, are the segments within IT spending and how they will perform. Specifically, cloud and managed services will likely comprise a greater percentage of total IT spending than in previous years.
IT spending in 2014 was roughly $960 billion. Of this amount, roughly $100-150 million could be considered managed services and cloud computing (cloud computing being a minority). Managed services in 2015 could reach as high as $250 million or roughly a quarter of all IT spending in the world. We’ve come a long way since 2000!
Conclusions
Whatever happens in 2015 MSPs will be prepared. Adversity is nothing new for MSPs and we’ve addressed these challenges in past. 2015 will see greater opportunities for MSPs. Years of advancement and progress have brought the MSP community to a point where we have become vital to the ongoing operations of many IT departments around the world. We expect this reliance on managed services to remain strong and grow significantly in this new year.