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Though overall IT spending is expected to drop in 2009, channel partners say revenues from managed services will grow about 20 percent, according to an international IT and telecommunications strategy firm with U.S. offices in Manhattan.

 

Officials at Access Markets International Partners, Inc., or AMI, say that as the global recession deepens and IT budgets shrink, managed and hosted services could serve as a silver lining for channel partners.

 

According to Avinash Arun, a senior analyst at AMI, about one out of every three U.S. channel partners offers these types of services, and this economy presents a strong opportunity for them.

 

“Revenues from IT services and support, particularly in a slowing market, are important for partners, so many of them are struggling to shift their business models to focus more on value-added services,” Arun said.

 

This isn’t entirely “new” news.

 

As TMCnet reported, many in the world of IP phone systems are turning to hosted voice services, which save on installation and maintenance costs and allow a business to grow or contract one employee at a time, without wasting money on a PBX (News - Alert).

 

According to Rob Wolpov, president of a Manhattan-based company that offers hosted IP-PBX services, this tougher economy shines the light a little brighter on the technology’s cost-saving potential.

 

Wolpov’s company, Junction Networks, was founded in 2004 and offers business VoIP services. Its flagship offering, OnSIP, is a completely managed hosted PBX service for businesses which want an outsourced communications platform. As its name suggests, the solution’s platform is SIP-based, and offers inbound, outbound and toll-free inbound calling.

 

“There are many economic advantages to the OnSIP offering over competing hosted services and PBXs themselves,” Wolpov told TMCnet during an interview here. “The tough economy just shines the light a little brighter on the potential savings.”

 

For AMI, one major reason that partners continue to look for ways to grow their services business is the relatively higher margins they yield compared to hardware. According to AMI’s 2008-2009 Channel Partners Studies, U.S. partners say they derive, on average, 41 percent margins on sales of IT services, 36 percent on Internet services and 35 percent on custom software development.

 

By way of comparison, the margins they earn on sales of computing and networking hardware are typically about 50 percent lower, AMI says.

 

For the channel partners’ small and mid-sized business customers, the deteriorating economic environment means increased scrutiny on all IT investments. According to AMI’s most recent SMB quarterly-pulse surveys, 67 percent of businesses are expecting decreased revenues in the coming months and 66 percent expect to restrict cash flows during the same time. This in isolation appears to be a grim forecast for IT channel partners.