Ingram's Murai: MSP Offerings Bring New Value To VARs

Ingram Micro's plan to bring managed services opportunities via its new partnership with LPI Level Platforms is only the latest in a series of moves the distributor has made to help VAR partners bring more value to their customers.

That's the message Ingram Micro President and COO Kevin Murai sent in his keynote address at the distributor's VentureTech Network Fall conference, held this week in Palm Desert, Calif.

Solution providers said they like the managed services message from Ingram Micro and said the distributor's new offering is coming at the right time.

Shawn Reilly, a sales rep at Lincoln Computer Services, Hicksville, N.Y., said Ingram Micro's relationship with Level Platforms is a way for VARs to offer another value-added service without a large, up-front investment. "It takes a lot to be able to offer a managed service," Reilly said. "Now we can leverage a big company."

Lincoln had offered managed services in the past, but that part of the business took too big a hit after the Sept. 11 tragedy, Reilly said. His company recently decided to try again and had already signed up directly with Level Platforms before it knew about the new Ingram Micro relationship.

"We will see what happens now. We have a good relationship with Ingram Micro. It's hard for a small VAR to get into managed services. We may potentially invest in our own NOC [network operations center], or we may use Ingram Micro," Reilly said. About 60 percent of Lincoln's business already comes from services, including technical, break-fix and maintenance services, he said. "With Ingram Micro, we can extend our services."

Gia McNutt, CEO of Special Order Systems (SOS), a Rocklin, Calif.-based solution provider, said Ingram Micro's move to add managed services comes at just the right time for her company, which in the past offered services using the N-able platform but found it too expensive.

"This offers VARs a way to get in [on managed services] without a big investment," McNutt said. "It's a smart move for Ingram Micro. It lets us try it out without a big capital expenditure. It's very relevant to what we want to do."

McNutt said SOS has been at the forefront of IP telephony over the past couple years. "But that's a project-oriented, cyclical business," she said. "We've been needing this [managed services] to smooth out our business. Otherwise, we're working our tail off for the peaks and valleys."

Murai followed the introductory presentation about the Level Platforms partnership given by Justin Crotty, Ingram Micro's vice president of North American services, with perspective about how the partnership fits the distributor's overall goal of helping solution providers evolve their offerings to meet new IT market trends.

For instance, a couple years ago, Ingram Micro saw significant growth in data capture and point-of-sales in the retail and manufacturing markets that could be exploited by the channel, according to Murai. "There were opportunities you had to leave on the table in the past because you didn't have that experience," he said.