Infotech Lead Europe: 12 million plus SMBs in Western Europe spent one fifth of their total ICT budgets on IT support services.
Remote managed services are taking a growing slice of the pie and enlarging its overall value.
The impact of the cloud in SMB markets is having its effect on service provision as well as traditional ICT infrastructure.
Improved Internet connectivity, business management familiarity and comfort levels with cloud service concepts, tied with the effects of the economic slow-down in Europe, have heightened the appeal of remote managed ICT services (RMITS).
The spread of Internet trading and e-commerce, as well as 24-hour availability of web sites for customers, are spurring the need for out-of-hours support. The combination of these factors is contributing to the 12 percent anticipated growth in RMITS spending in Western European countries through 2016.
“ICT support services have traditionally been the preserve of the local channel partner as Western Europe SMBs want their support providers to be close at hand and knowledgeable about their companies,” said Hugh Gibbs, VP Research for EMEA, and the study’s author.
“The increasing availability of remote monitoring and management tools and hosted datacenter facilities have lowered the barriers to entry to service provision for a large number of traditional VARs and resellers, and simultaneously encouraged the emergence of a new generation of start-up—‘pure play’ managed service providers (MSPs),” Gibbs added.
Service providers and channel partners have had to make efficient use of their skilled technical support resources and to service a larger number of customers. RMITS tools have enabled them to do this. Remote managed services have also allowed them to penetrate the larger numbers of small businesses with more competitively priced RMITS options. RMITS tools also allow service providers to deliver a more proactive and differentiated service to their customers.
