Mike Vizard

All posts by Mike Vizard

Mike Vizard has covered IT for more than 25 years, and has edited or contributed to a number of tech publications including InfoWorld, eWeek, CRN, Baseline, ComputerWorld, TMCNet, and Digital Review. He currently blogs for IT Business Edge and contributes to CIOinsight, The Channel Insider, Programmableweb and Slashdot. Mike blogs about emerging cloud technology for Smarter MSP.

Alternate cloud service providers are on the rise

Alternate cloud service providers are on the rise

A much larger percentage of IT organizations appear to be less committed to the top three cloud service providers as it becomes more apparent that the compute and storage platforms being delivered have become commodities. A survey of 458 development...

/ July 6, 2022
Salaries for IT pros with cloud expertise present MSP challenge

Salaries for IT pros with cloud expertise present MSP challenge

As the number of workloads shifting to the cloud continues to accelerate, one of the biggest limitations in terms of the addressable market for managed service providers (MSPs) is now the salaries of the IT professionals that have the expertise...

/ June 29, 2022
Survey shows MSPs gaining ground with SMEs

Survey shows MSPs gaining ground with SMEs

A survey of 1,007 IT decision makers at small-to-medium enterprises (SMEs) in the U.S. and United Kingdom suggests that managed service providers (MSPs) are now being viewed as more essential than ever before.

/ June 16, 2022 / 4 Comments
Zero-trust IT creates major opportunity for MSPs

Zero-trust IT creates major opportunity for MSPs

Interest levels in approaches to creating zero-trust IT environments are now reaching a zenith. A survey of 800 IT and security professionals, conducted by The Cloud Security Alliance (CSA), finds 94 percent of respondents are in the process of implementing...

/ June 8, 2022
Remote work has forever changed managed services

Remote work has forever changed managed services

When the shift to remote work first occurred, there was a sense that no matter how bad the COVID-19 pandemic became there would be a return to the office. Two years later the pandemic is still with us, and the...

/ June 6, 2022 / 4 Comments
Multi-cloud is here to stay

Multi-cloud is here to stay

A survey of 360 CIOs and IT leaders in the US and the United Kingdom finds 82 percent of respondents have adopted multiple clouds, with more than three-quarters (78 percent) deploying workloads in more than three public clouds. Conducted by...

/ May 30, 2022
New security guidance will raise cost of delivering managed service

New security guidance will raise cost of delivering managed service

The cybersecurity authorities of the United Kingdom, Australia, Canada, New Zealand and the United States have issued an alert to notify managed service providers (MSPs) of an increase in malicious cyber activity and provide best practice security guidance for how...

/ May 23, 2022 / 6 Comments
Tips for MSPs to weather the economic storm

Tips for MSPs to weather the economic storm

A major downturn in the global economic outlook is causing business and IT executives to reevaluate their IT spending priorities. In the wake of spiraling inflation driven by the ongoing conflict in Ukraine and rising oil prices, many of the...

/ May 17, 2022 / 6 Comments
Lack of confidence in network operations creates MSP opportunity

Lack of confidence in network operations creates MSP opportunity

A survey of more than 400 network infrastructure and operations professionals from Fortune 500 companies suggests a growing lack of confidence in internal network operations teams may be creating an opportunity for managed service providers (MSPs). Conducted by Enterprise Management...

/ May 5, 2022
Patch management continues to be an MSP opportunity

Patch management continues to be an MSP opportunity

One of the dirty secrets of IT is that even when organizations are aware of a critical vulnerability, they are often unable to do much about it. In some cases, they are unaware if they are using a software component...

/ April 28, 2022