From Cloud To Security: 10 Solution Providers On The Biggest Opportunity Over The Next Decade – CRN

It’s been 40 years since CRN launched. And as part of our 40th anniversary celebration, we are taking a look every month this year at the past, present and future of technology and the channel. This month, we asked a collection of solution provider executives what the biggest opportunity for their business will be over the next 10 years.

From an explosion in demand for cloud to opportunities in security, here’s what solution provider executives are focusing on between now and 2032.

Looking ahead, what’s the biggest opportunity you see for your business over the next decade?

Sonia St. Charles

CEO

Davenport Group

St. Paul, Minn.

The biggest opportunity in the next decade for Davenport Group will be increasing our services while continuing to support customers as they make huge leaps in their operating world. Even as technology has advanced, supporting customers, educating them, helping the with change management have become huge opportunities. We’re doing that now, but the breadth of what’s needed will be expanding rapidly in such areas as security and infrastructure. These will be huge opportunities for us. We not only have to add new customers but support existing ones. It’s a huge opportunity, but a difficult one given the pace of change. Twenty years ago, I never thought we’d be doing things for customers like hyperconverged infrastructure or virtualization. Yes, we were starting to see virtualization, but hadn’t considered how much it would change things.

Joyce Mullen

President, CEO

Insight

Tempe, Ariz.

I would not be surprised to see decentralized data environments like the intelligent edge grow bigger than the public cloud today, and we’ve established deep expertise across all of it. Edge computing allows for faster data analysis and more deliberate operational decisions; these should be priorities for all organizations looking to work more efficiently and be in better tune with what is going on across their business. It also often can be an affordable, attainable and cost-efficient solution, based on their unique business needs.

But technology and business leaders need to be in lockstep on charting a transformation strategy to successfully scale and operationalize edge computing as they also modernize business applications, data platforms and networks to become a more intelligent business.