Ed Crowley
The convergence of managed services and managed print services is going to be significant…huge for this industry in 2012. It’s a trend Photizo identified in 2010 and we are now seeing it come to fruition. There is a critical mass building in terms of programs and an ecosystem developing around this, most recently with announcements like Agiliant and Level Platforms. This will raise the bar for those currently playing in the MPS, making this space very interesting and competitive.
This will also be the year that separates those that can from those that can’t. There are firms that have been doing MPS for awhile, excelling at it. They are starting to take the leap into offering Stage 4 business process outsourcing, document workflow management—things that are transformative to their customers beyond just managing the fleet. As the first stages of MPS become commoditized, more and more vendors are striving to advance to these “stickier” opportunities. Those that can make this transformation, not just manage the fleet, but go beyond that and impact the customer’s business model, are going to put huge pressure on everybody else to go all in. It is going to be the critical year for those who haven’t and are still sitting on the fence.. They will feel the pressure intensify.
We’ve called 2012, The Year of the Channel, but it will boil down to commitment. Are resellers willing to invest in the people, time and resources and are they 100 percent committed to this transformation? What really surprises me is that there are a large number of resellers that know they need to change but are five years away from retirement and would rather hold on till the end than attempt this challenging transformation. That’s sad because this is a huge opportunity and those that don’t make the investment may see their business expire more quickly than they think.
Photizo will work even more closely with the channel in 2012 to help them be successful. We have great relationships here and we work with some of the top hybrid resellers in the market and continue to build those relationships. It’s exciting to see how this market is growing. What’s interesting is the consistency of how they’re managing and consistently growing their business in a challenging business environment. It’s a positive affirmation.
For Photizo, our visibility in this industry is going to significantly grow. We’ll be keynoting at for the MPS Bootcamp at XChange Solution Provider event by Everything Channel, and of course, there’s our upcoming Global Conference, Transform 2012, in May. We’re expecting more than 400 attendees from around the world to come out this year. Each year it continues to grow, and we’ve refocused the MPS Conference to be centered around transformation, encompassing the convergence of this industry.
