At a cloud computing road show hosted by Axcient and Hewlett-Packard, Axcient CEO Justin Moore offered a simple recurring revenue reality check for VARs and MSPs. Moore conceded that many VARs are hesitant to pursue managed services. But then he offered a real-world cloud computing example that showed channel partners how to gradually build to more than $700,000 in annual recurring revenues.
Now that Best Buy (BBY) has completed the mindSHIFT acquisition, let’s take a much closer look at the financial aspects of the managed services and cloud services acquisition. MSPmentor has gathered some hard-to-find financial metrics about mindSHIFT’s business. Examine the numbers and you may get a better feel for managed services provider (MSP) and cloud services provider (CSP) valuations.
As the New Year approaches, we’re looking back at the most read managed services stories of 2011. Yesterday, we recapped the 10 most read MSP news stories from Q1, 2011. Now, let’s look at the most read MSP stories from Q2, 2011 and their implications for managed services providers.
In recent months, MSPmentor has evangelized all-in, per-user managed services pricing. We’ve told readers to follow advice from TruMethods, an MSP coaching firm that promotes a “cake” pricing model, rather than an “ingredients” pricing model. Generally speaking, I think TruMethods’ advice is right on the mark. But some readers keep telling me per-device pricing for managed services is alive and well, particularly in the emerging mobile device management (MDM) market.
Best Buy is acquiring mindSHIFT Technologies, one of the top managed services providers in the SMB market, for $167 million. The Best Buy-mindSHIFT deal ends a major chapter in the managed services market — and begins a new one as well. Updated, 9:12 a.m. ET, Nov. 7: Here’s a closer look at the potential implications of Best Buy purchasing mindSHIFT.
