Managed Service Providers (or MSP’s) have been participating in a pretty high growth business environment over the last few years. These organizations range from the major Telcos (Verizon and AT&T) to major hardware vendors (IBM and HP) to major System Integrators (CSC and Accenture) to regional niche players. It seems that just about anyone who is involved in IT wants to join the lucrative business of outsourcing or co-sourcing their customers networks and environments.

As WLANs become more prevalent and mission critical, this new area of networking is drawing the attention of many of these players. A year and a half ago, Verizon Business was one of the first to jump in a public way into this arena. It makes sense with Verizon’s history of wireless, networking, and now outsourcing, that they would be a leader in WLAN management. But Verizon Business is not alone in this field. Just about every MSP that offers network management is preparing to also offer WLAN management.

As these organizations enter into the WLAN management arena there are a few pitfalls they need to be aware of:

1. WLANs need to be managed differently the LANs. Due to the inherent nature of wireless, these devices need to be monitored in very different ways than their router and switch brethren. MSPs who make the mistake of just offering simple “up/down” status will not be doing their customer any favors - it is critical to provide RF management and optimization to ensure that not only are devices up, but that the network is actually working.
2. WLAN management needs to be integrated with LAN management. I think MSPs grasp this one pretty quickly - from a purely cost perspective. If the MSP has to build out a parallel infrastructure just for WLAN management then it will take them a long time to make a profit. By integrating WLAN specific tools into their existing operational infrastructure they can gain leverage and re-use many of the skill sets and processes that they have in house.
3. WLAN is just the beginning. Any MSP who starts discussing with their customer about managing their WLAN needs to understand that its not just the APs and/or controllers that need to be managed…it’s all the rest of the network as well. This includes the authentication infrastructure, the wired network that the wireless devices connect to, power, firewalls, etc. This is a great opportunity for the MSP to showcase all of their wares but they have to have this mindset from the beginning.

MSPs have a great opportunity in the WLAN space and can provide a fantastic service to their clients. As this market matures this level of service is going to become more and more important.