Art,
We looked at All Care through Konica Minolta but the contract T's & C's were so one sided we thought it was written by the Mafia. The bottom line was they got paid (by the Dealership) whether or not the customer paid you or not.
I was speaking to a VP of a large independent dealer on the east coast who had a discussion with the principal of his company. What it would take for his company to do Managed Network Service. His answer was we can:
1) Hire people
2) Partner with a company
3) Buy a company
What the principal wanted to hear was yes, we can do it with the people we have and it won't coast you anything extra. But it was the job of his VP to tell him the truth, and not just what he wanted to hear.
I laughed a little when he said that because i have had the same conversation with my principal, not just on MNS, but MPS (so had he).
The thinking that we can just take this on, assumes (wrongly) that the key technical people have the time to do more. I once told my boss that I was working 16 hours a day, and he said what are you doing with the other 8 hours (LOL).
This thinking wrongly assumes that the key technical people have the skill set to do MNS or MPS. Just because someone is a good SE and can support the pre & post sale of connected devices, does not mean that they have the skill set to manage Windows 2008 Servers, or Exchange Servers, or Web Servers is misinformed.
We need to make sure that we stay close to our core competencies and if we do branch out to these para endeavors that we bring in people with the skill sets to be successful.
Vince