Winners of the first Managed Services & Hosting (MSH) Awards revealed

With the growth of managed services as an IT supply model, and now that we have some level of established good practice and evidence of real change being delivered to customers, it is only right that excellence and success is now being recognised. These unique awards aim to attract and reward the best examples of real projects and demonstrate just how effective and productive the use of managed services can be. By assessing both the projects and the MSPs themselves, the aim is to highlight the real value being delivered and the growth of skills in the industry.

Managed Services & Hosting (MSH) Awards 2018 The Winners

Best Public Sector MSP Project

HIGHLY COMMENDED - Capita IT Services

Workspace Agility is based on cloud technologies from Microsoft and Citrix with enhanced user experience and a managed service wrap from Capita. It enables digital channels, self-service, self-heal, automation and increased flexibility for local government users that need access to a Windows 10 environment from any device or browser.

WINNER - Carelink

A NHS Foundation Trust needed an IT managed service provided to deliver a safe, secure and comfortable environment for service users, relatives and carers communication and support. A robust, mission-critical and secure platform is hosted on high availability virtual servers.

Best Enterprise MSP Project

HIGHLY COMMENDED - Gamma (nominated by Highlight (SLM))

Gamma has helped customer Berendsen to upgrade from a basic DSL network to a more robust fibre network to cope with expanding business. Highlight has been set up and proactive monitoring and alerting mean Berendsen can now fix issues before they impact users or end customers.

HIGHLY COMMENDED - Spirit Data Capture Ltd

Spirit Data Capture specialises in sourcing, developing and deploying mobile enterprise solutions for a wide range of markets aiming at "one-stop-shop" where Spirit does all of the management, from initial logging through to resolution.

WINNER - CSI (nominated by IBM)

CSI were selected by a wealth management company as the partner to deliver the Managed Services IBM Power Cloud environment, together with Windows and Linux operations. Using the tools as a SaaS offering means it can outsource IT and focus on their clients, business operations and management.

Best SMB MSP Project

HIGHLY COMMENDED - Infinity IT Solutions

Infinity's Monitoring & Management is a cloud-based agent that allows it to monitor the health of client's devices remotely anywhere and anytime. It is suitable for a range of assets and platforms Microsoft, OSX and Linux included.

HIGHLY COMMENDED - The PC Support Group

The project moved a charity's email and file sharing systems to Microsoft Office 365, all in the cloud, removing the need for investment in local servers and reducing operating costs. Microsoft Azure was also added to the mix to manage user logins, removing the need for a new, on premise server, and the client discontinued its in-house IT support function, moving to The PC Support Group's fully managed, outsourced service.

WINNER - Frontline Consultancy

Frontline has implemented, hosted and supports a mobile device management (MDM) solution for field agents. The MDM solution (dWatch) enables companies to keep track of their business data anywhere, anytime whilst allowing employees to remain.

Most Innovative MSP

HIGHLY COMMENDED Blue Chip

Overseeing at least 700 businesses worldwide, Blue Chip saw how enterprises had a hunger for creating data-driven opportunities at a low and flexible cost. Speed, efficiency and flexibility are crucial factors for their client base and for picking up new business. With this in mind, Blue Chip established a software-defined data centre where it achieved an "astounding reduction" in on-boarding time, from three months to just 1-2 days.

HIGHLY COMMENDED - Mirus IT Solutions

Mirus' Apprentice Accelerator Scheme is a new initiative aiming to create over 20 apprentice roles across all departments, in the next two years. It also created a brand-new role with the sole purpose to mentor and develop apprentices.

WINNER - METCloud

METCloud is a cyber-secure hybrid cloud platform designed specifically for small and medium sized businesses aims to be not just a technical response but also offers support services to assist businesses in achieving and maintaining standards such as ISO27001, ISO9001, ISO22301, Cyber Essentials and Cyber Essentials PLUS.

Most Innovative Managed Service Solution: General

HIGHLY COMMENDED - Jola

Jola offers an M2M management portal to allow resellers and their customers to manage 4G data SIMs globally. No other portal allows MSPs to order and manage data SIMs from all the networks in the way Mobile Manager does with a managed 4G router as a satellite broadband replacement service.

HIGHLY COMMENDED - Node4

Originally providing infrastructure as a Cisco partner, Node4 now offers a range of products and services, including colocation, managed hosting, cloud infrastructure, and hosted unified communications. Node4 owns three UK data centres, with wholly owned infrastructure and operating systems so is therefore able to manage every service from beginning to end, all from the security of its own data centres.

WINNER - BluJay Solutions

Among the managed services offered by BluJay are Logistics-as-a-Service (LaaS) and Integration-as-a-Service (IaaS). MessageBroker is a fully managed, best-practice B2B integration that cuts complexity and cost out of e-commerce trading.

Most Innovative Managed Service Solution: Security

HIGHLY COMMENDED - WatchGuard Technologies

WatchGuard Total Security Suite for Managed Security Service Providers (MSSPs) empowers MSSPS to do more through one partnership when faced with the same threats as large enterprises but without the same budgets or in-house expertise.

WINNER - Datto, Inc

Datto SIRIS is a Business Continuity and Disaster Recovery (BCDR) solution built specifically for managed service providers (MSPs) to keep their clients' businesses running in the wake of a disaster. Advanced Backup Verification enables MSPs to run verification when the backup is taken, eliminating the need to scramble during recovery time.

Best Vertical Market Managed Service Solution

HIGHLY COMMENDED - ra Information Systems

ibcs has become a leading software management solution for the comprehensive management of flexible space providers. The system is developed completely in-house and is modular by design so it can be tailored to the specific needs of any business and budget, including Contract Management, Meetings, Conferencing & Events, Facilities Management, Digital Signage, Finance & Direct Debits and Management Reporting.

WINNER - Flexera

Flexera's Software License Optimization solution assesses the current state of asset management maturity, builds the justification for a SAM and license optimization program, and develops best practice SAM processes and roadmaps for program implementation.

Best Cloud Platform-based Managed Service Solution

HIGHLY COMMENDED - ANS Group

ANS' Managed Cloud offering enables public and commercial sector customers to optimise the efficiency of their cloud platform, while reducing spend. ANS GLASS is a platform which allows customers to view incidents and changes, projects, service-level data and access the cloud cost explorer.

WINNER - Highlight

Highlight is a multi-tenanted, cloud-based network monitoring and reporting tool designed for sales, service management and operations teams to see clearly all IT services through a single pane of glass dashboard, rendered in near real-time.

The Managed Services & Hosting Awards were developed and organised by IT Europa and Angel Business Communications to recognise excellence in the development and delivery of managed services and hosting technologies and solutions. The awards build on the success of the Managed Services & Hosting Summit series of events which are now entering their 9^th year in the UK and third year in Europe. The 2018 awards were presented at a reception in London following this week's UK Managed Services & Hosting Summit.