From AI pilots to profits: The next opportunity for MSPs

To date, the AI opportunity for managed service providers (MSPs) has largely centered on deployment. While early stages focused on which platforms to buy and how to start piloting, the market has reached a tipping point. Businesses are no longer looking for experiments; they are looking for infrastructure.

That picture is shifting. Today, most organizations are no longer asking whether AI has value. They are asking a more complex question: how do we make AI part of the way our business actually operates?

A recent McKinsey report showed 88% of global organizations are now using AI in at least one business function, yet only around one-third have begun scaling it across the enterprise, with the highest-performing focusing on redesigning workflows rather than simply deploying new tools.

For channel partners, this shift represents the next commercial opportunity. As AI becomes more accessible, selling AI tools is becoming less of a differentiator. The real value is in moving upstream: helping customers redesign workflows, build employee confidence, and embed AI into everyday business operations.

Successful AI depends on successful workflows

Many organizations have already demonstrated that AI works. They've run pilots, tested new use cases, and proved it can deliver productivity gains. Yet many of these projects struggle to scale beyond a single department.

Our data highlights the scale of that challenge. More than half (54%) of UK organizations remain in the research, exploration, or pilot phase of AI adoption, while only 16% have fully deployed AI-powered digital workers. The reason is straightforward: AI has often been added as another standalone application instead of being embedded into the everyday workflows where people already spend their time.

The organizations making the greatest progress are taking a different approach. Rather than asking where they can deploy another AI tool, they're asking where AI can remove friction from everyday work.

Communications is a natural place to start because every customer conversation, meeting, and interaction generates valuable business intelligence. When AI is embedded into those experiences, it can automatically capture actions, surface insights, reduce administration, and improve customer experiences without employees changing the way they work.

The MSP role is changing

This is where the channel has an opportunity to evolve. Historically, success for enterprises was measured by delivering projects on time and deploying new technology. Increasingly, customers need help answering broader business questions.

Which processes should change to make AI genuinely useful? How should AI fit into customer service and employee workflows? How do organizations measure whether adoption is actually delivering a return? How do they introduce governance without slowing innovation?

These are strategic challenges rather than technical ones, and they create opportunities for partners to build much deeper customer relationships.

Take customer service as an example. Deploying AI to summarize calls or recommend next actions is relatively straightforward. Embedding those capabilities into day-to-day operations, training teams to use them effectively, redesigning processes around them, and measuring their business impact is where long-term value is created.

That is also where recurring services revenue begins. Helping customers embed AI into everyday operations and refine workflows creates an ongoing partnership, rather than a one-off implementation project.

Learning from the cloud playbook when it comes to AI

When organizations moved to cloud platforms, the biggest opportunity for partners wasn't simply selling licenses. It came from helping customers migrate, redesign processes, improve adoption, and continuously optimize their environments. AI is following much the same trajectory.

As deployment becomes easier, customers will increasingly look for partners who understand their business rather than simply their technology stack. They'll need trusted advisors who can connect AI to business outcomes, whether that's improving customer experience, increasing employee productivity, or streamlining operations.

For Managed Service Providers (MSPs), that represents an opportunity to move beyond implementation projects and become long-term strategic partners.

The next phase of channel growth

The AI market is entering its next chapter. The first stage rewarded partners for helping customers buy AI, and the second will reward those who help customers operationalize it.

Customers don't need or want any more disconnected AI tools. They need AI embedded into the conversations, workflows, and business processes that already power their organizations.

The partners that help customers make that transition won't simply deliver better AI projects. They'll create stronger customer relationships, unlock new recurring service opportunities, and establish a role that extends well beyond deployment.

Ultimately, the biggest opportunity for the channel isn't just selling AI tools. It's helping customers change the way work gets done.