‘Become the disruptor or be the disrupted’: MSPs reflect on Pax8 Beyond EMEA
UK partners share their takeaways on the event, their evolution towards the MIP model, and their relationship with Pax8
During Pax8 Beyond EMEA, the second edition of the cloud commerce marketplace’s European event, MSPs gathered to hear about the latest innovations hitting the channel, and how to make the best use of them to drive business growth.
This year’s announcements revolved around transformation, especially towards the MIP (managed intelligence provider) model, praised by Pax8.
But what did partners think of these declarations? Concrete predictions, or trendy buzzwords?
To answer these questions, CRN sat down with MSPs including Logiq, Cobalt, Evergreen, GTS Dynamics, Nebula IT Services, and SilverCloud, who shared their main takeaways on the event, alongside details on their relationship with Pax8.
Ian Dunstan, CEO, Cobalt
What are you biggest takeaways from the event?
“The future is here already; we're all adopting and using AI.
“We all have implemented cybersecurity tools in our business, but it's not enough, and either you become the disruptor, or you are the disrupted.
“I’m a disruptor in the way that I work within my business, and the way that [Cobalt] works within the industry.
“We're bold and innovative, and it's about making sure that we're staying one step ahead of not just our market and our industry, but against bad actors.”
How do you feel about evolving to the MIP model?
“We're a long way down that journey already.
“AI? Not new. The structure of it as a business? Not new.
“To better work with your customers, we understood quite early one that we deed to become a managed intelligence provider.
“We’ve changed from being technical providers to being business consultants.”
What's your relationship with Pax8? Are you a long-time partner?
“I found out about Pax8 a couple of years ago at an event.
“Prior to that, we’ve been consuming Microsoft licences from another partner; it was a very transactional relationship.
“Pax8 brought all the solutions into one marketplace, and provided help and support.
“It wasn't just a transaction. All of a sudden, you were a partner, and you felt like a partner.”
Is there anything they could do to support you better?
“How they support us now is great, they're driving things forward.
“The world has never moved this fast, and it will never move this slowly ever again.
“When it comes to the actual final delivery of what the AI product looks like, how we're going to accelerate it, how they are going to help us build agents, there is a lot of talk about it, but not quite enough delivery.
“We haven't got that final product, because I don't think they quite know what it looks like.
“I know where we're using it, how we're implementing it, how things are going on, but the real push of not just doing it within our business, but getting our customers better with it, is something that they need to really grasp.”
James Walker, CTO, Logiq
Andy Gilbert, managed services director, Logiq
What are you biggest takeaways from the event?
Andy Gilbert: “The MIP announcements, the maturity in the AI offering, and ultimately moving us as service providers into that long term partner shared value proposition.”
James Walker: “It's helping us look forward rather than just staying where we're at and doing better where we're at.
“It’s always great meeting with the other partners and seeing how they're going on their journey.”
How do you feel about evolving to the MIP model?
Gilbert: “Truth is, we’re early in our journey, but really comfortable that we've got the right partner to help us with that direction of travel.”
Walker: “We've got skills in the business to help us with that, and we're helped as a business because we have a large consultancy side, significantly bigger than the MSP one, where we've got some of those AI skills.
“When it was announced in Denver, it gave us a sense of urgency, and that was clear what [Chasin] was trying to get across with those quotes, but we're actually already doing some of that.”
What's your relationship with Pax8? Are you a long-time partner?
Gilbert: “We joined Pax8 a year ago at the Berlin Beyond event.
“This relation has been more than just about financial remuneration.
“It’s very focused on relationships.
“We can engage with likeminded, professional, skilled individuals that can help us move forward and drive our business where we want to be.”
Is there anything they could do to support you better?
Gilbert: “We can’t think of anything they could improve.
“Every time we've engaged with Pax8 when we needed help, they've had a track to support those outcomes, or they let us engage with them, regarding whatever kind of domain of interest.”
Walker: “If there's anything, it would be about further sharing our problem space and Pax8 demonstrating, ‘We had these other partners with that same problem, and this is what we did for them.’”
Gilbert: “The depth and breadth of the offering is vast, and it’d be interesting to have access to a catalogue view of what Pax8 offers.
“They are willing to go beyond a catalogue, rinse and repeat approach to offer in their service, to make sure whatever they do put in front of you is aligned to delivering value for you.
“It would be interesting to have a balance between the two.”
Isobelle Coventry, UKI M&A professional, Evergreen
What are you biggest takeaways from the event?
“It’s been great to see all the updates they are building from what was shared during Denver back in June.
“It’s exciting to see the marketplace they have been building, how the integrations they're going to build come into play, and how intuitive features are going to be introduced later down the line.”
“There has also been this focus on achieving this balance between becoming a technology led advisor and being that managed intelligence advisor to your customers, because we believe very strongly that you need to really understand your own clients’ outcomes.
“That's how you build very long, lasting, sticky relationships with customers.”
How do you feel about evolving to the MIP model?
“We’re pretty ready.
“When I'm out looking for businesses to acquire, I'm always thinking beyond on just the metrics and the financials, it’s about what the quality the business is like, and their willingness to grow, towards an MIP model for example.
“We spend a lot of time building on that ethos and that mentality that's already in the business.”
What's your relationship with Pax8? Are you a long-time partner?
“We've been a long-time partner with Pax8.
“They play a big role in how we support our businesses going forward.
“When we acquire an MSP, we're not centralising them into one platform, a big part of our ethos is keeping each business decentralised.
“The brand stays the same, the team stays the same, we're not going in and changing processes dictating what stack or systems you use.
“We have around 120 MSPs globally, and having really strong partnerships with people like Pax8 is fundamental, because we can help our businesses without changing anything of their day to day, but opt in to much better pricing agreements.
“The relationship we have with Pax8 spreads to each one of our MSPs, so the partnership we have with them is very fundamental for that reason.
“I feel like every person I know at Pax8 is, on a personal level, a great person. They really believe in what they're doing. It comes across.”
Is there anything they could do to support you better?
“I personally see things they could do differently; we have a very strong relationship.”
Chris Pottrell, MD, Nebula IT
What are you biggest takeaways from the event?
"It's solidifying that MIP message for us.
“We travelled to Denver, when they first delivered it, and we were pretty much engaged from the get-go.
“Between now and then was a large part of discovery about what it is, how you deliver it.
“I think we’ve got some things right, it’s interesting to see Pax8 refine the message around how to achieve it.”
How do you feel about evolving to the MIP model?
“We're very early, one of the first adopters, probably in the UK, to draw a line in the sand.
“We made the decision not to convert our MSP into an MIP but almost start a sister company.
“If we hadn't constantly evolved our MSP, we would have stagnated, and we would have absolutely gone backwards.
“The rate of evolution to MIP, turning us almost into business consultants, technology consultants, as well as the delivery of agents.
“That's just untapped revenue for us. It’s going to be quite fun.”
What's your relationship with Pax8? Are you a long-time partner?
“We've been a partner for about three years.
“Prior to that were having historical problems with vendors; it wasn't a proper relationship.
“They were always branded as partnerships, but they felt very one sided.
“I remember having conversations with Pax8 for quite some time to say, ‘If we lean into you, can you lean back and support us through the journey?’
“They've absolutely done that.
“We’ve been a very early adopter of the MIP model, and they've been very open about how they're working to develop what that is, and it’s quite rare to have a partnership this transparent.”
Is there anything they could do to support you better?
“Honestly, no.
“Whenever I've asked for some assistance, it's always been proactive.
“What's quite nice is we can speak to anyone at any level.
“You've got a team on your side who is really enthusiastic.”
Dean Cowell, director, GTS Dynamics
What are you biggest takeaways from the event?
“The main theme of the event has been the agent movement, building up agents, and looking at how we're going to change the model of MSPs.
“For me, the biggest change is looking at what resources we employ as a company, and having a focus on how do we get agents to do work within our client base, as opposed to having lots of people in the business and them continuing to generate more resources on their side.”
How do you feel about evolving to the MIP model?
“I don't think we're quite ready as a space, but I do think that from this event, that's going to be a key focus of ours.
“For us, it’s now more about getting skilled in testing, in doing agents, and starting to work on, how to deploy that and get that into businesses in a safe way.”
What's your relationship with Pax8? Are you a long-time partner?
“We're a long-term partner with Pax8.
“We lean into their services, not just to buy and sell in terms of the products, but we look for their professional services team and outsource the work to them.
“Once that project is complete, we take on the management of that.”
Is there anything they could do to support you better?
“We have a lot of meeting with them, and they’ve got a lot of good content on their site.
“I feel like it's my responsibility to go through that and make sense of it.
“If there was something they could improve, it would be probably the account managers booking more focus sessions on that content and helping us as partners make that time to step through that content.
“I’d like for my account manager to phone me and say, ‘Dean, next week, one hour session focused, let's make this happen.’
Kenny Watson, director of automation and technology, SilverCloud
What are you biggest takeaways from the event?
“The opportunity with AI and agentic AI for supporting businesses is huge.
“We've got some of the best speakers on the planet here today, from Microsoft to the Pax8 experts.
“It's been quite enlightening; it's trying to get that roadmap to be able to deliver that for our customers.”
How do you feel about evolving to the MIP model?
“It’s already part of our strategy at SilverCloud.
“We see AI and automation as a clear part of our future.
“We are up for it, and we've already done some events ourselves focused on AI automation.”
What's your relationship with Pax8? Are you a long-time partner?
“We've used Pax8 for about two years, and the amount we’re using it is growing steadily.
“The main reason that attracted me to them is their strong marketplace."
Is there anything they could do to support you better?
“Not at this stage for us.
“I'm looking to potentially look more into some of their academy stuff.
“I think they've got a reasonable roadmap for the future.”