Channel Dive (Informa) has been writing about the only public TSB, Scansource/Intelisys. The hardware distributor side of the business can’t understand why the TA side of the business (Intelisys) won’t sell hardware. TA’s don’t bill, collect payments, deal with sales taxes. Get it, Mike Bauer?

Besides Intelisys in 2016, Scansource has made 3 acquisitions in this division: Resourcive [a TA], Advantix [managed connectivity], and DataXoom [wireless MVNO]. Anything for recurring revenue now

“Since receiving growth funding from Charlesbank Capital Partners in late 2021, Bridgepointe has invested over $200M in 47 strategic partnerships through its Equity Partner Program, fueling growth, innovation, and long-term value.” This TSB is more of a super-agency like Upstack than a TSB like Telarus.

Avant has made acquisitions as well. Except for grabbing PlanetOne, most M&A has been boutique to grab a specialist. It is hard to find acquisitions that can match the culture there. Drink that Kool-aid or else!

Upstack is still buying agencies, but as the Agents hit tenure, the few I know became W2’s.  Can’t say enough how much you need an attorney when selling your business! Upstack does not act like a TSB nor are they set up functionally to be a TSB.

Bluewave is also buying agencies in its pursuit of being a super-agency. Their money ($75M) comes from Columbia Capital, which also owns Telarus. Still waiting for that merger to happen. Telarus is five years into their investment. VCs usually hold for 5-7 years. PE (private equity) is usually shorter (up to 5 years). In both cases, when the limited partnership fund is closed, all investments must be closed out.

BTW, even Crunchbase uses the term Technology Solutions Brokerage (TSB) not Distributor (TSD), because the former master agencies do not distribute anything except commission checks.

Sandler is still private and still moving along as a growing TSB.

Telarus befuddles me because the management is always spinning a story about how they are like Accenture. That analogy is one Bridgepointe is using but the majority of TAs do not bill consulting hours. And Accenture has 110K employees billing hours as the firm tries to not implode during the AI push. The Big Consulting groups are now pivoting to an outcomes based billing approach at least when it comes to AI projects.

There are thousands of cybersec vendors (about 4000 is the number I just saw). There are 2800+ Agentic Ai companies. There are 2000+ providers in the US offering UCaaS or Hosted PBX. They all want partners selling their sh!t. They all are looking for the golden TSB to deliver that gold.

ACS just made a splash by landing Sparklight, the cableco formerly known as Cable One. Why? Partners sell a lot of network. In fact, network (broadband and internet access) plus voice make up 80+% of transactions through the TSBs.

AppDirect is the one that makes the most noise. And it is just noise. I can’t figure out the plan. My buddy Greg says it is world domination. That makes as much sense as anything.

AppSmart acquired master agencies CNSG, Microcorp, Acuity, TBI, WCG, and Telegration. There may have been more. AppDirect killed the AppSmart brand. They also killed the TSB. The focus is on the B2B marketplace, cloud apps and enterprise. AppDirect has made many other acquisitions, let’s see if they make sense to you.

AppD buys Tackle.io this month to get access to hyperscalers and give sales assist to partners as they try to enter the hyperscaler sales world. “Tackle.io provides an end-to-end platform that enables software vendors to identify potential buyers, collaborate with cloud partners, and transact through cloud marketplaces.  The platform offers three core capabilities. First, it helps companies identify cloud buyers through their Tackle Prospect tool, which provides data on who is purchasing through each cloud provider to accelerate sales opportunities. Second, it enables companies to co-sell with cloud partners by automating the cloud co-sell process and maximizing relationships with AWS, Azure, and Google Cloud. Third, it allows companies to list and transact on cloud marketplaces, optimizing marketplace operations and integrating seamlessly with Salesforce to provide unified visibility into marketplace data, co-sell activities, and cloud buyer intent.”  Tackle.io has processed over $10 billion in marketplace transactions and forecasts that cloud marketplace throughput will reach $100 billion by 2026. It was valued at $1B when AppD acquired it.

That fits with the acquisition in May 2024 of BuiltFirst, which is now called AppDirect’s reseller store, since Builtfirst is a B2B marketplace platform that allows companies to launch white-label, cloud-based partner hubs. Oh and it is low-code just so we stuff in all the keywords.

Last month, AppD bought one of its invested partners, NXTSYS, an MSP-Focused regional TSB. That is likely a route to get more MSPs into the AppD sphere of influence.

They also bought an AI company [Devs.ai agentic AI platform], which seems to be just an CLEC of AI. In other words, it just seems to resell ChatGPT and the other branded LLMs.

Last December, AppD bought Firstbase, an IT Asset management platform, that allows partners to Procure, deploy, manage, and retrieve team equipment anywhere through a single all-in-one lifecycle management platform. An enterprise tool. They acquire a lot of Enterprise tools despite the fact that more than 85% of all partner transactions are with SMB (under 500 employees).

This week AppD also grabbed vCom. “B2B commerce platform AppDirect has acquired vCom, an IT lifecycle management provider for midsize companies. The closure of the $100 million deal, announced Wednesday (Dec. 10), will see vCom’s offerings embedded with AppDirect’s recently launched unified lifecycle management platform. “Integrating vCom’s lifecycle management platform, Buyers’ Club network, and mobile solutions into the AppDirect procurement suite will expand our customers’ ability to manage the end-to-end lifecycle of all of their technology in one single platform,” AppDirect CEO and Chairman Nicolas Desmarais said. [pymnts]

They acquired two Energy brokerage businesses –  Brokeronlinexchange.com and DNE Resources, which fits in with the old AppSmart TSB business.

In 2023, AppDirect acquired ADCom’s network operations center, monitoring platform to launch managed services suite. It spun this out to look like a TA business, which fits with what they are doing with NXTSYS.

Maybe Nicolas should be on ADHD meds. I wonder how he explains this to his investors.

Ingram and TD Synnex are like Scansource. They are hardware and software licensing distributors with a cloud brokerage and some telecom brokerage.

Avant, Sandler and Telarus are similar in that they are largely a pure play TSB.

Bluewave and Upstack are the same.

Bridgepointe is a hybrid of Bluewave/Upstack and a TSB.

AppDirect is its own weirdo. AppSmart was started with the WCG merger in 2019.

Most of the $1 Billion plus of investment in the TSB space is now going on 4 years old. Upstack got their Berkshire money in 2021. Avant got its $100M from Pamlico in 2021. Telarus got its cash from Columbia Capital in December of 2020. I know I have said that a transaction should have happened already and it hasn’t but I am still mind boggled by why investors find this space attractive.

HNA acquired Ingram Micro for $6B in 2016. Big money. HNA had troubles. Platinum Equity grabbed Ingram for $7.2B in 2020.   The IPO was well-received initially. Ingram Micro priced its offering in 2024 at $22 per share (middle of the $20-$23 range) and was over-subscribed. The stock closed its first day of trading at $24.60, representing a strong 11.8% first-day gain. The offering raised $409 million and gave the company a market valuation of $5.8 billion. The stock is up 6%!

For institutional investors and Platinum Equity (which remains the largest shareholder), the IPO successfully returned the company to public markets and raised capital to pay down debt. However, for retail investors hoping for strong IPO returns, Ingram Micro has been a disappointment, delivering below-market returns in what has been a strong bull market period.

So if they could slap together Avant and Telarus, like they did SYNNEX and Tech Data in 2021, they could IPO that company in 2027. If Ingram [NYSE:INGM], Scansource [NASDAQ: SCSC] and TD Synnex [NYSE: SNX] can sustain the stocks and the market doesn’t crash.

But PE didn’t really get a full exit from ingram with that IPO, but maybe enough of one. How will the investors get a return out of the Bridgepointe ($200M), Avant ($100M), Bluewave ($75M), Upstack ($50M + $100M), Telarus ($100M my guess) and AppDirect has taken in $575M that we know of but it is likely they took in another $1B in investment or debt or both this month. But I am not including AppD in the invested amount since they are not in play. Intelisys and Sandler Partners aren’t in play either. That is $625M in investment since 2020.

If Intelisys is any indication the TA space is growing at 4%.  [ Intelisys & Advisory net sales for the first quarter increased 4.0% year-over-year to $24.2 million reflecting the addition of an acquisition.] That isn’t enough for ROI. Even if other TSBs are growing twice as fast that is 8%.

One problem is that partners that sold out 3+ years ago have retired or moved on from the TSB. It would have been wise to have an M&A transaction at the peak, not on the other side of a peak.

I don’t think the partner space is growing like some talking heads suggest. Inter-connects are certainly not growing. VAR is not a preferred business model since the biggest vendors are pushing hardware as a service not hardware. The MSP is growing but it also has a lot of M&A and confusion. AI and cybersec are advanced skills that most of the 62K North American MSPs do not have. I know why everyone bets on the MSP model, but I don’t think most of the people who bet on it so heavily really understand the demographics. There are 1000 MSPs that sell to mid-market and above. The rest sell to SMB.

Lots of speculation. We will just have to wait and see.

 

 

 

It started with Dialpad, but now every UCaaS company – Net2Phone, IPFone, RingCentral, 8×8, yadda, yadda – has added AI to their platform. Why?

One reason is that the sales growth of UCaaS slowed to negative or single digits year over year. These providers needed something to bring interest again.

Another reason is that AI seems to naturally add on to the cloud comms platform for functionality in call center, customer service, and scheduling.

As AI explained, “UCaaS is becoming tied to AI because it offers a powerful story for demonstrating return on investment through increased efficiency, productivity, and better customer/employee experiences. AI provides actionable data from communications, automates repetitive tasks via chatbots and virtual agents, enhances security with features like voice biometrics, and creates more intelligent collaboration tools for hybrid and remote teams. These AI-driven capabilities are becoming key differentiators for UCaaS vendors, making them crucial for companies to remain competitive.”

I don’t know about Differentiation, when everyone has similar functionality.

The real differentiation for UCaaS & AI going forward will be verticalization. Domain and market knowledge will be the difference between a generic bot and one that provides an ROI.

Two providers do a decent job of spelling out the AI+UC+CC puzzle.

(1) AI in UCaaS brings automation and insight to everyday communication. Instead of routing every call through the same IVR tree, systems can now recognize caller intent, past history, or account data to send calls directly to the right person.

• Virtual agents (by voice or chat), can take care of repetitive tasks like checking balances, scheduling appointments, or answering FAQs, so staff don’t have to.
• Conversations can be transcribed in real time, with key points pulled out automatically for follow-up or documentation. This saves time on note-taking and helps teams stay aligned.
• Sentiment analysis flags when a customer sounds frustrated or upset, which can help with service recovery or coaching.
• And real-time dashboards track things like call volume, average wait time, abandonment rates, and agent performance—so managers can spot issues and respond faster.

Together, these AI features replace manual busywork with tools that improve accuracy, speed, and visibility.  [Sangoma]

I don’t know if this will all occur in real-time, but certainly in near real time, since in real life there is a lag in AI response.

Another function that they don’t talk about is real time translation and real time accent improvement.

“By automating routine tasks and making collaboration more intuitive, AI is helping teams communicate in ways that are smarter, more productive, and more human-centered than ever before. AI’s rapid evolution boosts productivity and accessibility. It turns UCaaS into tools that actively support and elevate the way teams work together. By automating routine tasks, offering intelligent insights, and personalizing user experiences, AI is driving a big shift in how businesses communicate and collaborate. From smarter meetings to more connected teams, AI’s integration into UCaaS is redefining what’s possible for today’s organizations.

For years, UCaaS platforms have focused on connecting people through voice, video, and chat. While effective, the human element of managing these interactions including scheduling, note taking, translation, and information retrieval has always presented challenges.

This is where AI steps in, helping to automate mundane tasks, provide intelligent insights, and personalize user experiences. AI liberates users to focus on higher value work, fostering more meaningful and productive collaboration. The integration of AI into UCaaS platforms is not merely an incremental improvement. It’s a change in thinking towards truly intelligent collaboration.”   [Burwood Gp]

That sounds good, but many businesses have undocumented processes. They don’t even know what the workflow is. Many businesses lack accessible data. If you do not have a Zapier connection to the software you use or an open API, then you will have a data project long before you have an AI project working. And that is where the problems lie. This all sounds good, but Implementation  and execution is all.

I was invited to speak to a group of Broadband Operators yesterday on #AI yesterday.  I am not an expert. I have spent most of 2025 taking classes, watching demos, selling AI food, and was involved in a few really cool AI projects (thanks to Strolid, Inc. & Thomas McCarthy-Howe, a certified genius!).

Here are 3 lessons:

1. You better have an AI Plan that starts now.
2. Most people are measuring the wrong things in AI POC’s. That’s why the dissatisfaction.
3. Every AI project is really a Data Project. Without good data, useless AI.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Agentic AI has over 2000 providers. It is a mess for 2 reasons: (1) it is too easy to be an Agentic AI provider and (2) 2000 of these providers lack Data, an integral part of the Agent being effective.

On the customer side, these projects misfire because most businesses are SMB (small business) and small businesses do not have data that is easily accessible. It is usually stored in some proprietary silo, like ConnectWise or Stripe or Quickbooks or customer software. Without data the AI Agent is a generic robot that might as well be the paperclip from Microsoft.

These businesses normally do not have written procedures and documented workflows. How can you add AI to a process if you do not know what that process or workflow is?

Here are six pieces for your AI Plan:

1. Let some of your employees play with AI and meet with them regularly to see what they like and don’t like.
2. Plan to upskill your workforce.
3. Map your workflows. Have everyone start documenting their processes.
4. Collect data – PDFs, FAQs, documents, workbooks, manuals, knowledge bases, everything.
5. Learn to Prompt!
6. Measure and then realize you are probably using the wrong yardstick.

Need help? Be happy to spend 20 minutes chatting with you.  Make an appointment to speak with me: HERE

If you want a copy of the slides, please email me at peter (at) rad-info dot net.

Big thanks to Gapingvoid for always producing great cartoons, drawings, books and insights.

Many partners came out of MCI and C&W. The largest CLECs would recruit on college campuses. College students could be exposed to telecom.

Today, no CLECs. No college recruiting. Most students have never interfaced with a telco. How would they even consider telecom or the Channel?

Heck, most finance people don’t understand the channel. How would a college student or a recent grad know that they could start their own business in the Channel?

At CVX Expo, people were telling me that Enterprise sales reps at the carriers have entered the channel. And that might be the last people in.

When many partners started in the Channel, the pay was all upfront. Easy to start when you can sell something in the first month, get it installed in a month and get paid within 90 days. Today, a UCaaS deal averages 12 seats at $15 is $180. 5X SPIFF is $900 but it could take a while to get that. And that $36 commission is going to come monthly after billing.

Bridgepointe told me that they have a program to help eager potential partners start off.

As many partners age out/retire or take advantage of the M&A taking place in both Agency and MSPs, there is a need to replenish the IT/Telecom Channel with fresh blood.

The Street and other business media is writing about the cellular industry having an issue with churn.  Chrun is up at AT&T. AT&T blames it on seasonal as well as hardware upgrades, but also discounts ended for auto-pay subscribers and paperless.

I think that AT&T, VZW and T-Mo, respectively, thought that an MVNO – Cricket, Visible, Mint – would help them lower CAC (customer acquisition cost), churn and device subsidiary. They have seen Comcast and Spectrum kill it in wireless as an MVNO.

Comcast has 8.9M; Spectrum has almost 11M.  T-Mo has 140M. VZW has 146M. AT&T has 119M.

When all things become equivalent, it is a commodity – and consumers want the lowest price OR at least not to have fees added.

I personally don’t understand the “discount expired” bullshit. If you call and spend 20 minutes on the phone, you get the discount for another year. And we will do that dance every year ad nauseum.

This shows how little these telcos think about the consumers. Play with the levers to make the payers dance.

Wait until I can have my voice AI assist call all the places I have subscriptions: SiriusXM, Netflix, Hulu, Google Fi, YouTubeTV and more. And just have them call every month regularly to ask for a discount. Switch the automation on them.

What happens when every consumer has a shopping assistant to continually lower subscription fees and get better offers?

On the flip side, with the macro-economics and politics making a mess of the economy, what happens when millions are unemployed?  Do CEOs consider that the economy largely spins on consumer spending, so what happens there are too many unemployed?

So far this year, U.S. employers have announced 946,000 job cuts, the most since 2020. The number of managers at public companies dropped 6.1% from May 2022 to May 2025.  This graduating college class faces stark employment choices.