‘AI Across The Board’: One Expert Outlines How The Technology Will Impact The Channel

‘You're going to see AI across the board in every other category,’ says Mike Crosby, executive director, industry analyst of B2B technology at Circana. ‘We're already seeing it in monitors and displays. You’re going to see it in routers, being able to self-monitor and optimize. That's going to be a common thing across all these other categories.’

MSPs currently have “a great opportunity” in their value proposition surrounding AI products and services, as well as consulting, as many businesses struggle with how to best use AI in their business, according to industry analyst Mike Crosby.

In fact, he believes AI tools and practices will hit midsize enterprise businesses first before being implemented in small business.

“That's where we see the biggest opportunity for refresh and where most of the volume is,” said Crosby, executive director, industry analyst of B2B technology at research firm Circana. “Typically with mid-sized enterprise, the bigger the business the longer the runway they need to manage that transition and make sure that they mitigate any risk. Small business, we think, it going to likely trail just a little bit.”

Crosby (pictured above) discussed U.S. B2B technology’s return to growth and the impact of AI on the channel at CRN parent company The Channel Company’s XChange August show in San Antonio, Texas this week.

[Related: ConnectWise Exec: AI Will Evolve MSP Landscape Over Next 40 Years]

It’s not just a lack in operating flexibility that SMBs face, he said, it’s funds as well.

“A lot of them have access to their capital through regional banks and right now regional banking is still struggling,” he said. “There were a lot of over-investments that were made in commercial real estate and a lot of those loans are upside down right now. I think it's going to impact their ability to really put out additional money in loans.”

He believes AI will accelerate in the SMB market by mid-2025. The first areas within a business to adopt AI functions are in operations and finance, followed by supply chain, he said.

But the biggest challenges with it are scalability and predictability.

In talking to CEOs of businesses, he said they anticipate that those CEOs will have to spend more money on buying AI-powered devices but are concerned that there isn’t enough ROI (return on investment) to justify the additional costs.

They also haven’t had a significant amount of time or scale to test it in their IT environments to understand any incompatibilities.

But AI isn’t isolated to PCs, he said.

“You're going to see AI across the board in every other category,” Crosby said. “We're already seeing it in monitors and displays. You’re going to see it in routers, being able to self-monitor and optimize. That's going to be a common thing across all these other categories.”

Carlos Diaz, CEO of Great Neck, N.Y.-based MSP Vulcan Business Solutions, echoed Crosby’s sentiment in that he doesn’t see SMB clients having the capital to refresh devices to AI-powered devices sooner rather than later.

“They’re doing hardware refreshes five and seven years down the road, which is impacting their business greatly,” he said. “I feel that bringing this insight to them, it's great and maybe it'll be a push for them to consider upgrading sooner.”

John Hill, CEO of San Antonio-based MSP TechSage Solutions, said there’s a huge opportunity with AI-enabled computers if clients upgrade quicker.

“If we educate our clients, it can increase productivity by properly leveraging the AI,” Hill said.