737 Kaseya 365: The Future of MSPs with Ranjan Singh

[Uncle Marv]
Yes, I am still in Miami at DattoCon. We are coming to the end of day two, and it has been a fantastic experience here. If you weren't here, yeah, you missed it.

Shame on you. But I've got a great interview to end off the day here. Ranjan Singh, chief product officer here at Kaseya.

And we're going to chat about some nifty little things here. I'm sure by now you have heard some of the great announcements that have happened here. Of course, more 365 stuff is in the way, but let me see what Ranjan wants to chat about.

Ranjan, how are you? I'm doing well, Marv. How are you?

I'm doing good. It's been a long day.

[Ranjan Singh]
It has been a long day, but it's been an exciting day. Lots of announcements from Fred and myself.

[Uncle Marv]
Yes, yes. Well, let me ask this question. Is it hard to, like, hold back on the announcements until they're actually here?

Because I'm sure the staff is like, what can you tell us?

[Ranjan Singh]
Yeah, it is. It is hard to hold back because especially our CEO that can't keep any secrets. But no, look, it is important to not just to keep it a secret, but we have to prepare.

We have to make sure that we have all the I's dotted and the T's crossed. Commercially, marketing, there is so much going on. These podcasts and the pre-releases.

So we want to make sure that it's not just about the announcement, but it's the execution, the rollout. It's a success. After all, it is a very big product launch, right?

And we don't want to undermine what we are doing for the MSP segment with these launches. We don't want information to come out in piecemeal fashion for folks to, let's say, interpret for themselves. Right.

Right. We want to own the messaging and the story and explain the why. And this is one of the big reasons why we have to keep it under wraps, so to speak.

[Uncle Marv]
Yeah. I had Nadir Merchant on earlier, and we talked about it from his perspective. Now, you being the chief product officer, now that the announcement's been made, you've been walking through the halls.

What is the reaction that you're hearing now that it's out here on the streets?

[Ranjan Singh]
Yeah. Yeah. The reaction is overwhelming.

Yeah. Right. And obviously, we got a lot of reaction and post-success of the Kaseya 365 endpoint that we launched in April.

We already have 5,000 customers and millions of endpoints already using it. The reaction from on Kaseya 365 users so far from the customer base, I met seven customers today, is from it's a no-brainer. Let's just go to the deal desk to, it is very, very compelling, and you're making me think very hard.

Yes. Right. And the great thing about Kaseya 365 user, and some of this existed in endpoint as well, but in user, our customer base is using a myriad of tools.

You know, they're using different tools for phishing defense, from security awareness training, from email back. They are literally using four to five different vendors. At least with endpoint, there was some convergence with RMM and then the security suite.

Here, they're literally using five vendors. So, the integration in the commercials has made it a no-brainer decision for many of them. One customer that I met today, literally his CEO, while he heard the announcement as Fred was announcing it, sent a note saying, I guess we'll be discussing this later today.

That's a quote directly from the customer. So, a lot of excitement around what we put together. Of course, a big portion of that excitement also is the fact that SaaS Alerts is now owned by Kaseya and is included for free in Kaseya 365 user.

[Uncle Marv]
I saw that, and I'll be honest with you, you know, people on the Reddit were kind of back and forth with stuff, wondering what's going to happen. I think the first thing I saw was, yes, the fact that it's included for free, obviously eye-popping to some degree. But I guess the next question is, for how long?

[Ranjan Singh]
Kaseya 365 is a license. The promotional price is $2.79, so it's not a question for how long it's included. It is included.

That is part of the Kaseya 365 license offering that you get phishing defense through graphics. You get security awareness training through Bullfish ID. You get email backup through SaaS Protection or Spanning.

And you're getting cloud detection and response through SaaS Alerts. So, and Dark Web ID, credential monitoring with Dark Web ID. I mean, this is the offering.

So, it's not like we will change the offer overnight. We haven't changed the offer. In fact, with Endpoint, as I'm sure you heard today, we added something for free into the Endpoint.

So, all existing customers are going to get DNS web and content filtering, right? So, to go back to your question, for how long? Well, it's included into Kaseya 365 because that is the offering.

[Uncle Marv]
I think that was the point that Nadir was trying to get across to me, because I mistakenly used the word bundle when we were talking about stuff. And my hand got slapped figuratively. But the idea that we're now looking at a product where everything is, for lack of a better phrase, included.

Yes. It's not an integration. It's not an add-on.

It's not an API that all of this works within the 365 family. That, I think, is huge. And that's coming from somebody who's not using all of your stuff.

I am using some of it. Okay. And I had to look at the economics of, okay, it's not just about the money for me.

It's about the processes that I have in place. But adding User to Endpoint is something that is going to make a lot of people not just think twice. They're going to think long and hard about, okay, I can move all of these into one platform.

[Ranjan Singh]
Yeah. That's huge. Yeah, it is huge.

Between Endpoint and user, we are talking about, technically, 12 point products that are included in there. And what you're purchasing, essentially, is two platform licenses. That's it.

And you're replacing, potentially, 10 to 11 vendors for those point products. So, economics, it's a given. We deliberately went after that in the sense that we have to make it a no-brainer because we know customers may still not use every one of those components.

And they're going to do price arbitration. Just like you mentioned just now, you're thinking about, you know, how much are you spending today? What if you probably don't want to switch some of the tools and you want to still use them?

Does the economics still work? And for the vast majority of customers, the economics do work, even if they choose not to use all the tools or they switch them. But there are two other aspects that are equally important.

You reference integrations and automations. That is key because somebody, I'm pretty sure our competitors, won't be able to put together a pricing bundle, as you referenced, right? At such a low price point, unless you don't want to be profitable or you want to minimize your profits, so to speak.

So that is an aspect. But the other aspect is integration and automation. And there is one other aspect.

Think about the time it'll take you to onboard 12 different products from 12 different vendors, right? And having to go into every tool and put in an organization name, put in the endpoints, put in the users, do it distinctly. With CASEA 365, we have a guided onboarding experience right from inside CASEA 1.

You're not thinking about 12 tools. You're thinking about onboarding two licenses, endpoints users. Yep.

You just deploy it to the organizations or you deploy it to the endpoints and you're done.

[Uncle Marv]
So for an emerging MSP, makes perfect sense. Yes. For someone like me, who's got my tools for years and years, we're looking at it from the standpoint of how much time is it going to take to move?

But the back end of that is how much time is it going to save me once it's moved, right?

[Ranjan Singh]
And one other aspect, right? So, A, how much time is it going to save once it's moved? But even on the front end, the question is, how much more are you paying today, right?

The faster you move, the faster you materialize the savings, right? So even if you have large deployments, you can take your time. Even if, in some cases, I'll give you an example.

CASEA 365 user is priced promotionally at $2.79. It's got five components in it. Customers are paying for, let's say, phishing defense on average $1.50. And they are paying for security administrating, let's say, another dollar. Just those two out of the five, they're paying $3 today, right?

So if they could move just those two tools, which are a lot easier to move, perhaps, compared to some of the endpoint tools, it works for you. $3 compared to $2.79. So the faster you move, you're going to save money. And then over time, you can look at cloud detection response as a brand new category.

There isn't even that much adoption of that tool set. So that alone is a no-brainer, right? Credential monitoring is a commodity, perhaps if you're using something.

So that's how you should think about it also. Just if you use one or two tools, are you paying more than what we are charging for, let's say, a 365 alone? All right.

[Uncle Marv]
I'm afraid to ask this, but you mentioned the word commodity. And just for full disclosure for people that are listening to this, there are other people in the room that probably have some legal state in what I'm about to ask. But the word commodity, there are people out there that'll look at this and say, OK, if everything becomes this 365 package and commoditizes our industry, drives pricing down, what does that mean for MSPs?

Yes, we can save money, but there are MSPs out there that are building their price where customers don't know what they're paying for it. But if they start to hear, oh, well, you're charging us this amount, but we can get it, you know, through Kaseya for $399, $275, that sort of thing. What is the, I guess, response to that?

[Ranjan Singh]
Yeah, a couple of responses. So the first is, I don't think of it as commoditizing. I think of it as democratizing.

OK. Right? So there are MSPs today, big and small, whose end customers say they can't afford some of these tools, and they choose to go without, so to speak.

Right. And we're talking about end user and endpoint security. So we are democratizing and making sure it's possible for every MSP to be able to include it in their service offer.

OK. That's part one. The second part about the pricing is that end customers, at the end of the day, just want a service.

So if the notion is that an end customer can come to Kaseya directly, purchase these tools, but the MSP provides a lot of service behind these tools. Right? And so there's a lot of value that the MSPs are building using this tool set.

They're not literally reselling the tool set. If they're just pure reselling, maybe there is some argument to be made. Right.

But MSPs are already adding a ton of value. Fred talked about it in his keynote. Right?

The injustice, the notion that an MSP does all this work. Right? Who's going to do all that work?

We already are seeing a trend in the industry where the notion of co-managed is coming in because the end user today can't deliver all the services themselves. They're actually coming back to the MSPs and saying, help me deliver these services. So the notion is literally the opposite of perhaps what you're suggesting may happen.

[Uncle Marv]
I wasn't suggesting it. I was just saying what I heard on the street. Fair enough.

Although, because I do live in that world, and I live in a situation where I've got customers that are looking at me for that value you mentioned, I'm lucky enough to have customers that they're not as picky about the price. So it's not a big deal. It's am I delivering what I promised them?

Am I keeping them safe? Am I protecting their data? That sort of a thing.

I also live in a co-managed world where I do have internal IT that's looking to me for help and assistance. So that is there. You mentioned the keynote and you mentioned MSPs.

I'm going to say not getting the respect we deserve, but this idea of MSPs, this unsung hero mantra that needs to be going out. Tell me more about that.

[Ranjan Singh]
Yeah, I mean, conceptually, it's very simple. If an MSP is doing their job effectively, their customers are protected, their customers never have to talk to them, never reach out. And that's what you want, right?

You want IT and security services to fade away in the background, not be visible. But then that poses a challenge saying, okay, I'm working so hard to achieve that, but my profitability is nowhere near the alternate services. And Fred referenced the accounting and the legal and other services.

Why not? Why work so hard and only make on average, you know, 10% profit? It is possible given the importance of a technology provider and technology in the role of SMBs.

SMBs are more and more reliant on technology. Who's going to provide that technology? If it's so vital, if it's the lifeline of an SMB, how is it that your profitability is only 10%, right?

That's what the notion, this notion of hero. Yes, hero is a big word, but fundamentally it's about fairness and it's about making sure that the MSPs are getting the economic value based on the services they deliver.

[Uncle Marv]
So I tend to look at it as not necessarily needing to be seen as a hero but needing to be respected in what we do. The value that we provide is just as important as some of those other services. Their businesses depend on our technology.

Absolutely. And the idea that, you know, we've promoted this idea that technology costs should be going down, down, down, but yet the protections that we have to do are becoming much, much more. So we have to do more work.

Without question. And you made the concept that, you know, if MSPs are doing their job well, the customers don't see us, they don't have to talk to us. Then we have to battle that.

Well, if we don't see you, for what are we paying? Yeah. So being able to show them that value, whether it's a TBR, QBR or whatever report to show them, look, this is how we protected your data.

This is how many, you know, ransomware attacks we prevented. All of these things. So, yeah, that monthly invoice that you see, it's, it might be a little low.

[Ranjan Singh]
Yeah, yeah. I 100% agree with you, 300% agree with you, right? There's two aspects.

One, by the way, you just referenced, you have to do more work. We actually conducted a survey last year where it demonstrated that over the last three years, the workload in terms of security alone has gone up 150, 200%. At least.

Right? And then the willingness of the end customer to pay for additional services is unchanged. Yes.

Right? So do two times more work for the same price. That's not getting the respect.

Right. The second part that you talk about is, yeah, it behooves us and other vendors in the market to make sure it's easy for you to demonstrate value. Right?

That's why we have our VCIO tool called My IT Process. And I talked today about how easy it is to build customized reports based on information fed from all the modules, based on the work you're doing, your SLAs, your response times, number of tickets closed, number of alerts, the security posture. All of this information is fed into My IT Process and you can customize the report and share it in your QBRs and your reviews with the end customer.

That's very valuable. We've also included free reports inside Kaseya One. So you can demonstrate the security posture.

Mr. and Mrs. Customer, you made the choice not to deploy certain security tools. Here's your security scorecard. Right?

I want to make sure you're protected, but this is the current scenario because of the services you're consuming with us today. And yet, look at my service delivery scorecard. I am exceeding every SLA.

I'm making sure we're responding to every alert, every issue that you're raising. And you can show that both. That's available for free for Kaseya 365 customers inside Kaseya One.

[Uncle Marv]
Very nice. Very nice. I know we're getting short on time here, but I want to ask a couple of other questions.

I don't know how related they are for you, but having the 365 endpoint and user now work together with licensing, what does that do for things like Datto, which I was a user of, IT Glue, which I use, Datto Networking I'm using? Is there going to be a time where all of these things kind of are rolled into one, where I can just log in once and just move back and forth between them all? Conceptually, yes.

Okay.

[Ranjan Singh]
Right? If you think about the long-term journey, we want to make it as easy as that. You're basically purchasing an IT complete license.

Right? We started with the Kaseya 365 endpoint and user. Invariably, we'll have more offerings.

But the simple answer to your question is those tools aren't going away anywhere. Right? IT Glue is a lifeblood for documentation.

Networking is a tool set of hardware and software that exists on its own. So it's like you need to deploy networking, or hopefully everybody's moving onto the SASE platform. Backup, whether you're doing endpoint or direct-to-cloud backup.

So all these standalone offerings, so to speak, coexist with the Kaseya 365 offerings. Why? Because we have an IT complete platform.

We've only covered 13 out of the 35-plus different components or modules that we have in the platform. We are building a roadmap. Yes, there will be more Kaseya 365 offerings, potentially in the future.

But just user and endpoint is the focus point. Right? You have to start somewhere.

Right. And that's why we chose to start here. Okay.

[Uncle Marv]
So it seems as though you've had a big announcement at Connect with the endpoint. You had the big announcement here with the user. What's next?

Well, we'll have to wait to uncover what's next.

[Ranjan Singh]
You couldn't slip that in. Yeah. We are a highly innovative company.

I showed in my keynote today, in the last 12 months, we launched 1,200 features on this platform. Organic, inorganic, as well as what we call killer features, which are needle-moving capabilities that will compel you to purchase a platform, as well as a whole bunch of improvements. Over 250 automations.

So there's always a lot to talk about. There's always a lot that we will bring to the market. But in terms of announcements, please come to the show.

This is the best way to uncover. Yeah. And it's not just to hear the announcement, because you are here, you are seeing both the reaction of the customer base, as well as the details.

You can go over to the demo booth. You can go to the expo hall and see these things that we're talking about and hold us accountable, so to speak. Now, Ranjan and Fred went on stage and announced all these things.

Are they real? Yes, they are real. It's not vaporware.

[Uncle Marv]
Yep, and I will attest to that. The vendor hall, well, of course, as soon as you walk in, all Kaseya up front and almost a booth for every product. So absolutely engaging there when you walk in and get a chance to see things with full demo stuff.

Yes, absolutely. That's cool.

[Ranjan Singh]
Yeah, everything that's in our roadmap that on my slideshow in the bottom left corner says launched or available, we can showcase it to you. If it's coming soon, we'll usually beta and demonstrate that to you as well. And if it's some visionary concept, we usually have designs and things to walk through because we want the customer feedback.

This is not just about us launching the product. This is also an opportunity. The vast majority of my product team is here.

And so and the service and support teams are here. We are engaging with customers. They are giving us feedback.

I'll have over 18 to 20 customer meetings. And so will Fred and all of my peers. So this is an opportunity for us to engage with our customers, hear their feedback, hear what's not working so we can keep improving and getting better.

[Uncle Marv]
Yeah, very nice, very nice. Well, I know that you have spent some time here. We probably got to get you out the door.

Are you going to be heading over to Sydney for the APAC?

[Ranjan Singh]
Yes, I will be in Sydney in two weeks’ time.

[Uncle Marv]
Nice. The weather is not going to be as good as it is here, though, is it?

[Ranjan Singh]
Well, it's the summer. Summer is approaching in the southern hemisphere. So that's true.

That's true. So for I live in New Jersey, so I'll be escaping the winters, the cold, slightly cold weather.

[Uncle Marv]
Oh, so both of these trips are going to be nice for you. Yeah, absolutely. Yeah.

All right. Well, glad you can be here. Thank you very much for the announcement.

Headed off to the beach.

[Ranjan Singh]
Yeah.

[Uncle Marv]
Thank you so much.

[Ranjan Singh]
Just from the window, I can see that's as close as I get. Thank you very much for the opportunity, sir.

[Uncle Marv]
Ranjan Singh here from Kaseya, folks. That'll do it for this episode. And check out the podcast.

I am doing vendor interviews on the floor. So all that next. But next time, be here.

That's really what it's all about. That's going to do it, folks. We'll catch you later.

And until then, Holla.