MicroCorp Inc. continues to transform its business model with the acquisition of Premier Management Group, the carrier services arm of VAR Premier Solutions Group. Terms of the deal, which closed Wednesday, were not disclosed.
MicroCorp announced in spring 2011 that it was seeking acquisitions in an effort to either expand its coverage geographically, improve its volume with a carrier or build its expertise in managed and cloud services. Earlier this year, MicroCorp bought Five Star Communications in Florida to expand its VAR and agent reach, as well as strengthen its relationship with CenturyLink.
Unlike Five Star, PMG will operate as a subsidiary of MicroCorp and will remain in Lancaster, Penn., alongside PSG, which specializes in hardware and managed services. MicroCorp has taken over the management of all of PMG and PSG's existing carrier customers, which gives the agency exclusive rights to all new carrier sales between PMG and PSG. As a result, PMG will continue selling carrier services while incorporating Cisco Systems Inc. equipment and various forms of managed services such as video, data center and security, all provisioned through PSG.
Brad Miehl, president and CEO of MicroCorp, said its subagents also can sell equipment and managed services, thanks to the PSG relationship "In order to survive long-term, our agent channel will have to provide comprehensive managed solutions to their customer base," Miehl said. "They will not be able to do this on their own. They will have to partner with quality companies and we intend to cross-pollinate with Cisco and other managed solutions throughout our channel."
MicroCorp is adding direct salespeople to serve VARs and integrators because of the PMG transaction. In a memo to employees, Miehl called this "a natural evolution to the master agency model — not to compete with our existing agent channel but, rather, to provide the launching pad to play in what I consider a much bigger sandbox: the VAR and systems integrator space."
MicroCorp plans to include direct sales to work with VARs and integrators "so that both sides are providing comprehensive managed solutions to the end customer," Miehl told staff. That's because VARs and integrators work differently than do agents. In other words, agents traditionally manage pre- and post-sales activities for network services. VARs and integrators, on the other hand, have little, if any, experience in this field.
