Uzuner Systems on why German customers no longer see MSPs as 'a necessary evil'

German MSP Uzuner Systems says one of the biggest opportunities for partners in the German managed service market is that customers no longer see MSPs as "a necessary evil".

MD, Frank Rosenkranz, told CPI that he's seen a change in customer perceptions of IT support from MSPs because partners have been able to act like a safety net, helping to back up critical data during a real global crisis.

"We're not just a necessary evil. We are a foundation," he said.

"Because in many, many companies, that's what we're seen as; as a necessary evil or a growing cancer. That's what my boss said to me 30 years ago. They think you're just spending money, you're not earning money.

"But these times have changed the perception of our value, and of what it is we deliver to the business."

The German MSP derives 89 per cent of its revenues from enterprise accounts and specialises in datacentre, virtualisation, networking, telecoms and security services.

Its global headcount of 120 is spread across Germany, Italy, Turkey, Brazil, Colombia and Zimbabwe.

Across its markets, Rosenkranz said the crisis has changed the conversation he's having with customers.

"They can see that without the remote MSP workers with the right technology to offer them security and services, they would have gone down in this crisis."

The SonicWall and StorageCraft partner is now more easily able to convince customers of the need for security redundancies and mirror datacentre systems in the cloud to protect data from malicious activity.

He added that he now sees this shift in perceptions as "a huge pool of opportunities" for upselling.

"We have to tell them okay, let's work as a foundation, get your IT systems right from the bottom up.

"Let's think about redundancy plans or a mirror system in the cloud. Get it secure. Think about the wide spread of your network when using traditional VPN systems. So there's a lot of things to be done for us. And it's very good chance."

Rosenkranz said that the Bremen-HQ MSP has been able to maintain growth during the COVID-19 crisis because of the acceleration in remote-working services sales.

However, as Europe starts to open up again, he said that the biggest challenge lies ahead.

Customer employees are now demanding more long-term flexible infrastructures, engineered to outlast a few months of lockdown.

"Now a lot of employees have proven that they're able to do their job out of their home.

"So that's going to be the challenge for enterprise businesses, to find a way to get the people back in that are not capable of working on their own and to maintain the rest outside the office securely," he said.

"There is a need to increase flexibility, to improve the life balance, basically."

Another challenge has been meeting customer expectations around procurement deadlines.

"We have seen a lot of impact on the typical business that we run. We saw the acceleration of that need to work from home, and that it needed to be set up within days."

According to Rosenkranz, the pressure on MSPs will be to maintain this rapid procurement pace but still maintain high security standards.

"These customer expectations of significantly reduced procurement will outlast restrictions.

"And there are ongoing security challenges ranging from spreading your business from a central location to a lot of satellites, and the need to be protecting all the endpoints."

Rozenkranz said Uzuner Systems has already seen a spike in demand for multi-factor authentication solutions, due to the proliferation of devices now being used for work.

In the telecoms space, he said there has also been a sharp increase in sales for all their unified communications services, from video conferencing to PBX systems.

When asked if he thinks customer perceptions will outlast the pandemic, Rozenkranz is optimistic that MSPs have been able to use the last few months to their advantage.

"We need to continue to be the big brother" he said.

"They have to understand that we're essential to their business."

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• Topics
• Solution Provider
• Uzuner Systems
• DACH
• German MSP
• Frank Rosenkranz
• COVID-19