ENTERPRISE TECHNOLOGY
solutions introduces additional cost and operational complexity.
“ A consolidated platform simplifies operations and reduces overheads, allowing MSPs to deliver a better service more efficiently, increase margins and improve the customer experience.”
Conway sees the same commercial pressures among Renaissance’ s MSP partners. Competition is increasing at the same time as labour costs and customer expectations, making profitability more difficult to maintain.
“ In response, MSPs should be looking towards consolidated platforms that reduce the number of tools they need to run, lower operational costs and cover more of what customers actually need.”
For Scalefusion, bringing management, security and compliance together is intended to give MSPs an alternative to maintaining multiple technologies across their customer estates. established relationships and a highly proactive approach. That mutual investment is what has made the partnership so effective,” said King.
Conway says Scalefusion’ s approach to margin and partner support was one of the factors that attracted Renaissance to the vendor.
“ They also came to us with better margins than we’ re used to seeing and a clear plan for how they would support us.”
However, he believes the nature of the vendor-distributor relationship was equally important.
“ For Scalefusion, distribution is about building a relationship, not simply creating a route to market. That approach is particularly important when you’ re establishing a vendor in a new market that is already crowded.” Different markets, consistent principles Although the UK and Ireland increasingly overlap from a channel perspective, Conway believes there remain important differences between them.
Scale is the most obvious. He estimates that the UK channel is approximately 12 to 14 times larger than Ireland’ s, with more end-user organisations, larger businesses and considerably more MSPs competing for customers. The character of the markets also differs.“ Ireland runs on relationships, with Microsoft having a big influence on how the market
Putting partner profitability first Technology consolidation is only part of the proposition. Both King and Conway believe partner economics will play an important role in determining which vendors gain traction in an increasingly competitive channel.
King argues that vendors cannot expect partners to invest significant resources in developing a practice if the commercial model does not justify that investment.
“ You don’ t get the best from partners by asking them to do more with less. We deliberately lead with stronger margins and high-touch support, so partners can build a practice around the platform rather than simply resell it.”
For Scalefusion, that includes dedicated training and enablement alongside investment in partner engagement.
King believes the relationship with Renaissance demonstrates the importance of investment on both sides.
“ We’ ve found that when we invest in partners, they invest in us. Renaissance, for example, brings deep market knowledge,
You don’ t get the best from partners by asking them to do more with less.
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