product sourcing

As frequent MSPmentor readers know, ConnectWise and Autotask develop PSA (professional services automation) software for VARs and MSPs. PSA is somewhat akin to CRM or ERP software — purposely built for VARs and MSPs. Autotask acquired VARStreet — a product sourcing and quoting system — in early 2010. Since that time, Autotask has been working hard to polish and improve VARStreet’s quality.

Now for the chess match: VARStreet competes with CNet’s ChannelOnline, an e-procurement and sales quoting tool for VARs serving small businesses. Earlier today, ConnectWise announced integration with ChannelOnline, claiming:

More Moves Coming

Now, the ball is in Autotask’s court. Over the past year, Autotask has quietly polished and enhanced VARStreet, and greatly expanded VARStreet’s user base along the way.

However, I think it’s safe to say that VARStreet needed more polish than Autotask originally expected during the acquisition process in early 2010. In recent months, Autotask has been pretty quiet on the VARStreet front, working hard on R&D rather than talking up the product sourcing solution in the market.

Still, it sounds like Autotask will make some noteworthy VARStreet moves during the Autotask Community Live conference in May 2011. One possibility includes a closer working relationship between Autotask-VARStreet and Synnex, a distributor that just launched a major managed services initiative.

It sounds like both the Autotask and VARStreet tools are part of Synnex’s expanding One IT initiative, which gives VARs and MSPs a single back-end system for running multiple business processes. Multiple Autotask executives attended this week’s Synnex Varnex gathering in Boston. And I hear Synnex VARs are beta testing some new Autotask-VARStreet capabilities… (Though Synnex will continue to integrate with ConnectWise as well.)

In the meantime, healthy competition between Autotask and ConnectWise continues to benefit MSPs. The ConnectWise-ChannelOnline integration, assuming it works as promised, should benefit plenty of readers.

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