The Managed Services Opportunity: creating Channel value around subscription services

Right now, the biggest challenge facing the Channel is sustaining growth by finding new sources of revenue. COVID has, for many, turned the budget taps off, as many businesses hold off on embarking on new IT projects and wait for the volatility in the market to subside. While the move to remote working provided a boost in sales in the initial phase of lockdown, we are largely at the tail end of the process. Recent research from TechRepublic found that 62% of IT budgets will be tightened and 17% of major projects have been postponed already, making it clear that a new revenue stream could be a welcome addition at this time.

Enter managed services. Set to be worth over $300 billion by 2025, managed services offer the Channel an opportunity for growth and development. While spending on projects may slow down in the short term, businesses are instead turning their attention to getting the maximum value from their existing IT infrastructure. There’s a large revenue potential that sits behind this change in priorities – but accessing it can be complex.

 

Maintaining networks efficiency: a growing revenue stream

Getting value out of technology deployments requires continuous maintenance and attention by expert staff, who can ensure everything is working effectively with regular updates and adjustments. This helps keep the system up to date, as things don’t stand still, with networks growing and evolving as well as usage models and software packages causing constant change.

Channel partners have the opportunity to step in and support businesses in this task and help maintain optimum performance. However, this can sometimes be a demanding onus, requiring conspicuous resources that smaller firms don’t have at their disposal. The managed services offering requires not only the addition of expert help but also access to the latest monitoring tools, not to mention sales and marketing collateral to promote the services. With so much to manage, it can feel like Channel partners are drowning in a sea of paperwork, admin and planning. Help, though, is at hand.

 

Helping Channel partners build visibility and extend their service offering

We understand the challenges that our partners are facing, so we have structured Nuvias Monitoring Services to fit current end-user demands, while removing the need for Channel partners to increase their own costs. With the automation the services offer, partners can turn their focus on identifying new opportunities and new prospective customers. To add value to our partners’ offering, Nuvias Managed Services can be white labelled and combined with a partner’s own offering. The services are suited to all implementations – from 10 to 10,000 devices. The larger the estate, the greater the value derived.

As part of Nuvias Monitoring Services, Nuvias Managed Services enable a proactive approach to maintenance, ensuring you anticipate and resolve any issues before they harm business productivity. Offering both managed and monitoring services puts Channel partners in a position to monitor and show the value provided and to offer tailored advice to each customer, improving the opportunity for renewed business.

 

Nuvias Monitoring Services

  • Nuvias Monitoring Services are an enhancement of an industrial-grade, Cloud-based platform, successfully tested for five years and deployed in collaboration with key vendors from the Nuvias portfolio. The platform’s functionality allows Nuvias support teams to monitor network performance and security solutions 24/7/365 and flag alerts on anticipated issues that could impact performance.
  • Nuvias Managed Services offer the next level of support by not just flagging issues but proactively optimising systems to maintain a high standard of operation. For example, through active management, businesses can ensure that as new devices are connected to it, the network still operates at optimum efficiency. Nuvias manages 500 assets as part of the current operations.

By taking a structured and programmatic approach, Nuvias teams ensure its partners can offer their customers the full value of the IT solutions they deploy. Additionally, there is a benefit for vendor partners, as this takes the pressure off their own support organisation.

Nuvias’ Monitoring and Managed Services are available in collaboration with vendors across Nuvias’ portfolio, including solutions from Riverbed, Juniper, Netscout and Fortinet. In addition to the ‘off-the-shelf’ range of options, services can be tailored to suit bespoke design and operating requirements.

“Working with partners who help our mutual customers to keep their environment operating at maximum performance is critical to Riverbed. Applications and Networks are changing constantly and having expertise on tap to manage this change is fundamental for high performing businesses. The Nuvias Managed Services help our customers keep control of their environment and use the full capability of their Riverbed investment”, Gary Duggan, Vice President, Riverbed Technology, commented.

 

Long-term business benefits: Intercepting the XaaS trend

The value that Nuvias Monitoring and Managed Services provide extends further than just adding an initial wave of revenue. As the industry is forecast to migrate towards SaaS-style subscription models, managed and monitoring services support partners in intercepting and taking advantage of this trend, giving them greater control over a steady revenue generation. Additionally, by providing a window into end-user security and network efficiency levels, they offer valuable data and insights for partners to have meaningful long-term planning conversations with their customers.

While major IT projects may be waiting for sign off, customers are keen to ensure they optimise their IT infrastructure to offer their business maximum stability and productivity. As many businesses opt to outsource services rather than growing their headcount by hiring in specialist staff, this represents a huge area of growth for the Channel. Partners can lean on Nuvias Monitoring and Managed Services to access this opportunity, future-proofing their revenue streams in alignment with the shifting industry direction.

To find out more about Nuvias’ 24/7/365 monitoring and managed services, and how you can offer them to your customers then please do get in touch. More information