Vendors under scrutiny as MSPs rethink portfolios
What to sell and how to sell it is a big challenge for many MSPs, and in a fast moving industry like technology it’s vital for portfolio management decisions to be fully informed and supported. Here, channel leaders share insights into how they are executing their portfolio strategies, along with in-depth reasoning that spotlights the need for vendors to become true enablers.
STEVE HARRIS,
CEO, CLOUDCLEVR
We’re not chasing breadth, we’re building further strength into our six technology pillars. That means deepening existing capabilities, refining how we go to market and ensuring every proposition contributes to a stronger, more scalable business. We’re focused on sustainable, profitable growth, which means aligning our offerings with the challenges our customers face now, not just the ones we anticipated last year. Evolving our business profile means making intentional choices and asking more of our vendor partnerships. We want true collaboration, not just commercial alignment. Vendors who understand our strategy and invest in joint success will earn a bigger role. We’re cautious about over extending, but ambitious about where we’re heading.
CRAIG ASTON,
CEO, CELERITY
Time to market is the key factor for our portfolio strategy. If a product is going to take more than two years to get to market, it is too long and needs to be contributing value in the next 12 months. The second factor is availability of skills, as without the requisite skills there is no point in developing the product. We are looking to somewhat widen our portfolio, but working with the core that we currently operate. We are looking to embed AI in all our product offerings, whether off-the-shelf offerings or self-developed IP. Vendors could give more thought to how their solutions fit into the specific partner product set. Most vendor offerings and campaigns are too generic.
SIMON FOGAL,
HEAD OF UC & CONNECTIVITY, ALFONICA
I'm currently shaping our portfolio strategy for the rest of 2025. This involves balancing customer expectations, making cost-conscious decisions and adapting to the shift towards cloud and AI-enabled services. We're taking a balanced approach by consolidating legacy offerings that no longer deliver value, and selectively expanding into areas like managed security, UCaaS and AI-powered collaboration tools. These are where partners are seeing long-term demand and sustainable margins. What I need from vendors is greater transparency on product roadmaps, consistent support through enablement and training and commercial flexibility that reflects sector trends. Stronger co-investment in joint marketing campaigns and lead generation, along with clearer product differentiation, would significantly strengthen our go-to-market efforts.
PETE WATSON,
CEO, ATLAS CLOUD
AI is the biggest factor shaping our portfolio strategy. We’re not looking to dramatically widen or shrink our service offering, but to refine it by embedding AI into what we already do to deliver faster, higher quality outcomes. In the short-term, that means using AI to streamline core operations like support, cyber threat detection and onboarding. We’re exploring opportunities to build and manage bespoke AI agents that solve specific challenges for our customers, particularly in regulated sectors. We’re keen to hear how suppliers can help us apply AI practically, especially around integration, security and cost transparency. The value will lie in AI that works in the real world, not just as a demo. Vendors who can get us there faster will get our attention.
LUKE STANTON,
SOLUTIONS SALES MANAGER, WELCOMM COMMUNICATIONS
Our focus is on smart expansion. We're moving PSTN services to digital alternatives and bringing UC and IT closer together to offer a more seamless managed service from connectivity to end user applications and support, with resilience and security at its core. Additionally, we're expanding our physical security proposition, including access control, asset tracking and smart CCTV. We're growing our portfolio to offer a more joined-up, consultative service that better meets the evolving needs of businesses. To support this, we need vendors to make their solutions easy to consume with APIs for procurement and management, and strong channel support.
RORY MCEWAN,
DIRECTOR, DUNEDIN IT,
In areas such as connectivity it’s becoming increasingly difficult for vendors to differentiate. Portals have evolved and commercials sharpened as they all sell access to the same carrier networks. Our priorities are cybersecurity and Low-code/No-code development, and how to monetise these. This is where we see most vendor choice, and while we look to build the most effective stack for customers we need market leading solutions at our disposal. Demand is driving the need for operational optimisation/efficiency so we’re engaging with vendors that can simplify our ability to deliver technology that helps them do that. It is critical that vendors offer tools that provide slick provisioning, management and billing/reconciliation as these are areas where we experience significant cost.
FRASER FERGUSON,
FOUNDER AND DIRECTOR, KUBENET
In December 2024 we audited our full portfolio and it was clear we were working with too many vendors. We’ve successfully realigned and where we had similar products, we’ve gone for best in class. With tech, it’s important that vendors stay with what works and not look to continually onboard the next big thing – engineers will thank them. Cyber, cloud, IoT and subscription services have been driving our portfolio strategy across MSP clients with a major push over the next two quarters to our wider base. Traditional services margins, including ethernet, continue to get squeezed, so products including Microsoft Teams calling and VM are increasingly important as we utilise capacity and increase our portfolio offering across our core network.
ROY SHELTON,
CEO, CONNECTUS GROUP
Rather than product-based we need to continue to drive an outcomes-based portfolio for our customers, adding value and accelerating their ROI. We will focus on becoming closer to their businesses and understanding their strengths, weaknesses, strategies and cadence. Areas we will invest in include cyber-as-a-service, which is growing as companies do not generally have the skills to prevent and manage a major cyber incident. AI-as-a-service is also growing because companies are struggling to balance the excitement of new opportunities with the associated security fears of deployment. Vendors must continue to support partners with education, training, pre-sales and marketing support.
MARTIN PATTERSON,
HEAD OF INNOVATION, AUXILION
Our portfolio strategy is driven by market factors, evolving customer expectations and emerging technologies. 2026 strategies are being reimagined by our target audience because of global events driving a focus on cost optimisation, demand management and robust digital capability offerings. The need for business strategy alignment is creating demand for AI, automation and business process optimisation. Compliance pressures (like DORA, NIS2) are intensifying the focus on cybersecurity. How we build our portfolio is informed by the direction of IT managed services, shifting from firefighting to preventing and protecting, with AI embedded in all levels of service delivery and a focus on business performance leveraging process orchestration, optimisation and operations.
CHERIE HOWLETT,
CMO, JOLA
MSPs we partner with plan their portfolio based on the needs of their customers and their own financial and strategic objectives. Vendors who advise on new solutions to existing problems help MSPs to win bids by understanding the needs of their customers and also saving them money. Working closely with MSPs and their end users during the sales process is critical when developing new solutions. Experts can customise solutions based on first-hand requirements and be on hand during the roll-out to ensure satisfaction. Vendors who work with MSPs to identify requirements and help put together bids backed up with testimonials help MSPs to improve their win rate.