Techaisle Blog

It is understandable that Dell’s PC-as-a-Service offering’s initial target segment is 500+ PC organizations which have sophisticated PC life cycle needs. However, judging by the number of inquiries Techaisle is getting in addition to its most recent survey, there is an untapped potential within the SMB and specifically midmarket segment. If 500+ PC is the cut-off then only 9% of US midmarket firms would qualify. If the threshold is lowered to 250+ PCs then 32% of US midmarket firms would open up as potential target segment. Stretching the statistics to 100+ PCs threshold, the total available market suddenly jumps to 56%. Midmarket is a huge opportunity, and the good thing with midmarket is that it is a whole lot less painful to move 250 to 500 PCs from Windows 7 to Windows 10 than it is to move 150,000. And they are less likely to be having a heterogenous PC environment.

Techaisle research shows that there are three key factors that make PCaaS a compelling value proposition for the midmarket firms.

1. Alignment with financial objectives with access to latest & advanced PC devices
2. Access to needed support services freeing up internal IT
3. Providing better control and manageability

A fourth point key point (a kicker and a key Dell differentiator) is added because of Dell and VMware becoming one company. Techaisle study shows that most midmarket firms are not yet aware about integration with VMware Workspace ONE, an integrated platform powered by VMware AirWatch and its inherent advantages. Because Dell and VMware are one company, Dell has been able to integrate AirWatch, a unified endpoint management technology, and the Dell Client Command Suite and extend PC management capability all the way down into the firmware and BIOS level of Dell PCs. This easily enables a single pane of glass through which IT can push policies, apps, lock-down, wipe and back up data.

Let us drill down into each value proposition and how Dell Technologies is differentiating itself.

Techaisle’s SMB & Midmarket SaaS adoption trends study shows that 30% of SMBs are using less than 5 SaaS categories and 42% are using between 5-10 SaaS categories and balance 28% are using 11 or more SaaS categories. Firms with fewer than five SaaS applications in use mainly consist of relatively smaller businesses and includes a relatively high proportion of firms without internal IT management, and a relatively low number of internal staff members. It goes on to indicate that there’s no direct correlation between managed IT environments, number of IT staff and the number of SaaS applications in use.

However, data provides a basis for seeing SaaS application adoption as a function of IT budget. Working with these statistics, it appears that initial adopters provision one SaaS application category per every $45K-$60K in IT budget. Once these organizations gain experience with SaaS (deploying more than four SaaS application categories), the pace of adoption quickens: businesses report an additional SaaS application for each $40K-$50K in IT budget until they reach 10 installed application categories, at which point the pace of adoption increases again, with one new application added for each $30,000 or so in IT budget.

Techaisle’s US midmarket digital transformation trends study shows that maturity of cloud adoption does not equate to high digitization of the business. Study data shows that only half of the 47% of mature midmarket cloud adopters are holistic adopters of digitalization. It is true that these firms believe in cloud and its effect on digitization but they also believe that true digital transformation requires advanced adoption of multiple technology solutions. Data also shows that the midmarket firms that have a siloed strategy of digital transformation are intermediate adopters of cloud, mostly driven by non-IT business units which need cloud to further their business objectives.

However, it is also clear from data that the Holistic segment includes a disproportionate number of mature cloud adopters, and mature cloud adopters in turn are much more likely to be Holistic in their approach to digitalization than firms in the intermediate category. A smaller (7% of total) third group of midmarket businesses, ‘born in the cloud’ (i.e., have all IT resident in the cloud) largely echo the patterns of the mature cloud users.

From a digitalization product/service marketer’s perspective, this is an important finding: it shows that those who can identify mature cloud adopters are likely to find greater receptivity to their messages and offerings than those that engage equally with the similarly-populous group of intermediate (in terms of cloud adoption) midmarket businesses.

High adoption of diverse technology solutions determines digitalization success

Even considering planned adoption, Siloed midmarket digital segment is likely to remain far behind the Holistic midmarket digital segment. The Siloed segment even lags being in the technology areas which midmarket firms see having the most impact in their business for the next 5 years.

A trend that is frequently discussed in industry journals revolves around the growing involvement of business decision makers (BDMs) in the IT acquisition process. There is a further issue that is not generally the subject of trade publication articles, though: the extent to which BDMs are going beyond system selection and acquisition, and involving themselves in IT operations.

To obtain some visibility into this issue, Techaisle asked SMB & Midmarket survey respondents (reported in three of Techaisle reports: 1/ SMB & Midmarket Buyers Journey 2/ SMB & Midmarket, ITDM vs BDM Decision Process) to identify the party (ITDM or BDM) most responsible for various aspects of cloud and mobility security. The results both provide insight into the IT operations activity levels of BDMs, and into potential issues that might arise as a result of ad hoc, unplanned and business driven IT purchases (or shadow IT).