MPS, MSP, ITO….Stage 4? OKI Data Americas partners with Agiliant
In 2010, Photizo Group expanded the three-stage MPS Customer Adoption Model to include a fourth stage defining a convergence between the world of IT outsourcing, business process optimization and business process outsourcing with managed print services. One of our clients pushed back, saying – “you’re moving too fast – we have just gotten the three-stage model embedded into our organization.” At the time, I felt confident that, if anything, we were moving too slow–forces were colliding to drive rapid convergence.
Today we are witnessing a very interesting development. OKI Data Americas announced a strategic partnership with Agiliant to offer OKI’s TMP (Total Managed Print) program through Agiliant’s MITOS™ (Managed Information Technology and Output Service) offering. This is the first OEM to form a partnership offering a bundled MPS/MSP program specifically into the BTA channel (the ‘copier guys’) in order to deliver Stage 4 services. It is interesting that this came from OKI and Agiliant, a relatively new company focused on enabling MSP capabilities in the BTA channel. See profile of Agiliant here.
Most vendors are dancing around the issue of how to deal with this convergence. Most of the major players (Xerox, HP, Ricoh and Canon) are offering these capabilities through their direct organizations. Konica Minolta has been purchasing firms to build this capability. But this is the first program I have seen which actually targets bundling the services together for the BTA channel.
OKI Data and Agiliant may have just set a new level of ‘table stakes’ for competing in the BTA channel. How will HP, Xerox, Ricoh, Canon and the other major players respond? Will the BTA channel embrace this new offering? Are they ready for it? And how will major players in the MSP space respond? Will this accelerate the adoption of MPS by leading MSPs, such as Buchannan Technologies or Pomeroy?
I believe we will look back at 2011 and say this is the year that the fourth stage became a reality. Not widely adopted, not mainstream, but real. Whether it’s Lexmark acquiring Pallas Athena (business process management software), Canon USA launching Canon Imaging Information Services (a Stage 4 enablement company), or The Capita Group Plc (a leading BPO firm in the United Kingdom) acquiring Right Document Solutions (a leading managed print solutions provider); the worlds of IT providers and ‘print’ providers are converging.
The world of managed service providers (MSPs) are on a high-speed collision course with MPS firms. In a recent Linkedin poll (http://linkd.in/tXuJJ7), I posed the question regarding whether MSPs would shake up the MPS market in 2012.
This was not meant to be a quantitative study, but it does provide an interesting view of the how impactful MSPs will be.
Are there barriers and hurdles? Absolutely! Photizo Group is hosting a webinar tomorrow with several leading MSP and MPS providers to discuss what they see as the challenges (and opportunities). The CEO of Level Platforms, the CEO of Agilant, MSPMentor, CompuGen and our own Ken Stewart (formerly of Kernes Business Solutions and Sharp USA) are all going to share their views on this convergence. Photizo Advisory service clients and MPS Insights PRO members receive complimentary attendance. Email hsmith@Photizogroup.com for more information.
In Europe, we see 2012 as the year of MPS adoption by the channel. In North America, I believe 2012 is going to be the year of channel transformation as the worlds of MPS providers and MSP providers collide.
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