SolarWinds Purchases LOGICnow to Corner the MSP Market

IT management software provider SolarWinds has acquired LOGICnow, the company announced on Wednesday.

SolarWinds said it expects the acquisition to help it capture an even bigger share of the worldwide MSP market by bringing together both companies’ portfolios under a single umbrella. SolarWinds specializes in IT management software, while LOGICnow has focused on integrated cloud-based IT Service Management solutions.

SolarWind’s acquisition of LOGICnow is the latest move the company has made to capture a larger share of the MSP market, following the company’s purchase of remote monitoring and management solution provider N-Able in May 2013.

The newly formed company is expected to serve 20,000 managed service providers worldwide, according to the press release. A separate division, called SolarWinds MSP, has also been formed thanks to the acquisition.

“SolarWinds MSP, combining the capabilities of LOGICnow and SolarWinds N-able, will offer MSPs a complete set of IT service management solutions via the cloud and on premises delivery models,” said Kevin B. Thompson, president and CEO of SolarWinds, in a statement. “SolarWinds MSP gives them everything they need to acquire and retain profitable clients, deliver outstanding levels of service and maximize their internal efficiency through standardization of their toolsets and the use of automation.”

LOGICnow CEO Walter Scott will serve as executive vice president for SolarWinds MSP. The financial terms of the deal were not disclosed.

“As SolarWinds MSP, our combined teams will utilize our deep domain expertise and industry-leading data analytics capabilities to deliver breakthrough innovations to our customer base of the world’s leading MSPs,” said Scott. “Our strategic vision and ability to execute will provide ever-greater support to our customers as they differentiate their services and achieve faster, more profitable business growth.”

Kaseya CEO Fred Voccola reached out to The VAR Guy with his reaction to the announcement, calling the acquisition an attempt to address the market conditions which drove Kaseya to launch its IT Complete solution.

“Neither N-able nor LogicNow (formerly GFI) have ever evolved much beyond basic end point management and are now reacting to innovations such as Kaseya’s in order to remain relevant to their customers,” said Viccola. “Their customers should be concerned about this M&A event not only because of the massive debt that SolarWinds is taking on in order to fund it – which in itself will require massive cuts in R&D and support to service it — but the uncertainty around which product will survive when they merge the two product lines.”

Regardless of whether or not the merger is in response to competition from the likes of Kaysea or other RMM solution providers, the news is significant for the channel because it means that SolarWinds is serious about expanding its global influence. It will be interesting to see how other companies react to the news and whether or not the acquisition is viewed as a power play or simply an attempt to chase market trends.