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 Channel Futures

Strategy


How Much Are MSPs Worth?

  • Written by Joe Panettieri 1
  • May 13, 2008

It’s a question I get asked all the time: How much is a managed service provider (MSP) business worth, and what metrics should MSPs use to set their company valuations?

I still don’t have an exact answer for readers, but here are some clues based on anecdotal info I’ve gathered plus Hewlett-Packard’s buyout of Electronic Data Systems (EDS).

Of course, most MSPs are tiny compared to EDS. But EDS is, essentially, a massive MSP that generates recurring revenue and also has feet on the street for customers.

HP plans to buy EDS for about $13.9 billion.  Now, let’s compare that price tag to EDS’s 2007 financial results. For fiscal 2007:

  • EDS’s net income was $828 million.
  • Also, EDS’s full-year revenue was $22.1 billion.

So, quick math shows that HP is paying 16.8 times earnings and 0.62 times revenue to acquire EDS. In stark contrast, most MSP sources tell me the buyout ratios are closer to 1 times revenue for a VAR and 1.5 times revenue for MSPs. I haven’t heard any MSP pricing multiples based on net income or operating income –but I’d welcome feedback from readers who are in the know.

Although MSPs have been buying up one another lately, it’s difficult to track valuations since so many of the deals involve privately held companies, as noted by our MSPmentor M&A Tracker.

Tags: Cloud Service Providers Digital Service Providers MSPs VARs/SIs Strategy

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7 comments

  1. Avatar Vincent May 13, 2008 @ 2:24 pm
    Reply

    The best way to check your company’s valuation is to have the business appraised or attend an event hosted by Martin Wolf Securities (www.martinwolf.com). They specialize in channel Mamp;As.

  2. Avatar Joe Panettieri May 13, 2008 @ 2:46 pm
    Reply

    Hi Vincent,

    Curious if you work for Martin Wolf Securities or if you have done business with them? I’ve interviewed Marty a few times for articles over the years and — as you point out — he is a good source for MA information. But I hope you can also tell our readers how you came across him? Have you sold a business? Purchased a business? Any key learnings to share?

  3. Avatar cwittiker May 13, 2008 @ 5:56 pm
    Reply

    We shopped our MSP practice in January 2008. We are running at 1.8 million annually (98 percent reoccurring) and the best offer we received (out of 2 offers) was around 1.2 times revenue.

    Charles

  4. Avatar Joe Panettieri May 14, 2008 @ 2:43 am
    Reply

    Charles: Very interesting perspective. So, reader feedback from you and others suggests that MSP valuations are anywhere from 1 to 1.5 times revenue. Curious to see if/how that changes once big technology companies begin to evaluate regional MSPs for acquisition.

  5. Avatar Nate May 14, 2008 @ 6:55 pm
    Reply

    If you can crack the $10 million mark on annual managed revenue, selling into midsize companies rather than mom and pop businesses, you can get nearly a 2X multiple on revenue in my experience.

  6. Avatar Will Scott May 26, 2008 @ 12:29 am
    Reply

    I have been watching this acquisitions in this space for a few years now, the transactions, where there is any kind of financial data available are a public company acquiring a private company – so we don’t know what else the company being acquired carries on it balance sheet; the Price / Earnings ratio doesn’t always tell the whole story – but there have been a number of managed services acquisitions several over the past 5 years that seem to indicate a trend. I break the deals down into 2 main categories – Economies of Scale acquisitions and Strategic Acquisitions.

    gt;gt; Economies of Scale Acquisitions

    When the company being acquired is being purchased for reasons to do the purchaser taking costs our of the company being acquired and driving economies of scale then transactions are around 0.5 to 1X revenue

    gt; EDS purchase of Loudcloud Managed Hosting – $65M for $75M revenue = 0.86 X
    gt; Navisite acquisition of Surebridge – $54M for $45M revenue = 1.2 X
    gt; Cognizant acquisition of Aimnet – $15M for $25M revenue = 0.6 X

    gt;gt; Strategic Acquisitions

    When the purchase is being made to augment a serious shortfall in the acquiring companies services portfolio or to gain a foothold in a adjacent market then it seems that the multiples that can be commanded increase to the 1.5 to 3 X Revenue range.

    gt; Verizon and Cybertrust – estimated $445M on $200M Revenue = 2.25 X
    gt; ATT acquisition of USI – $300M for appx $100m revenue = 3 X
    gt; Cisco acquisition of Netsolve – $95M for appx $40M of revenue = 2.4 X
    gt; Sun acquisition of Seven Space – $49M for est $30 M of revenues = 1.6 X

    There are a number of deals that have gone down over the past few years that it would be great to know the guts of to complete this picture – MCI and Totality amp; Getronics and Red Siren to name a couple. Also – if we could carve out the value that CDW placed on Berbees Managed Services or Insight placed on Calences Managed Services – this would be interesting to see.

    I am not sure that we can look at the HP / EDS deal as a pure Recurring Services Revenue deal and so not sure where there multiple fits into this picture – I would guess that a lot of EDS revenue was classic professional services non recurring revenue – which clearly gets a much lower valuation than annuity revenue.

    So I guess the (somewhat obvious) message – sell to someone who is needs your services for strategic reasons as opposed to a roll up.

  7. Avatar Joe Panettieri May 26, 2008 @ 12:07 pm
    Reply

    Will: Thanks for piecing these metrics together. I agree: Roll-ups can get messy. Anybody else remember USWeb? MarchFirst? Disasters in the making.

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