N-able CEO: Vendor ‘not for sale’, doubling down on channel to break away from MSP roots and add resellers to roster

John Pagliuca sets the record straight on sale rumours, outlining his channel growth strategy to CRN

N-able will not be going private and instead plans to double down on investments in the channel as part of its growth strategy for the SME market.

John Pagliuca, CEO of the NYSE-listed company, addressed previous reports that N-able was exploring a sale to Barracuda Networks, brushing them off as mere speculation.

“They were rumours,” he tells CRN.

“Barracuda is a great company. I know their leadership and have a lot of respect for their leadership, but rumors are just rumors.”

Pagliuca adds N-able doesn't plan on selling up to anyone and firmly states the software vendor is focused on its long-term growth plan.

“We're focusing on growing our business. We had our analyst day recently in New York City where we walked the world, on both the buy and sell side, through what we've been accomplishing, what our strategy is for 2025 and our long-range plan.

“So, our focus is on building long-range shareholder value. And that's what I'm 100 per cent focused on.”

Doubling down on the channel, adding resellers

And how does N-able plan to achieve this long-range shareholder value?

Pagliuca summarises his 2025 goals as scaling N-able’s security, leaning more into the channel, and providing a more tailored approach for customers by segment and size.

“Number one is we're going to continue to scale our cybersecurity offering,” he says.

In November last year, the vendor bought Adlumin, a provider of an enterprise-grade security operations platform for organisations of all sizes.

“With the Adlumin acquisition we’re the only company on the planet that's focused on the mid-market, focused on small, medium businesses that provides them with the complete best in class cyber resilience platform.

“So what does that mean? From a cyber resilience perspective this is important. People, when they think about security, what they really want is resiliency, business resiliency. And so we're going to scale that part of the business.

“We had initial success in North America, and now we're going to bring that to the channel in the UK and in the rest of the world.”

Point two he says is taking N-able’s “magic sauce” historically preserved for MSPs and extending it to the reseller community.

“The number two thing is, we're going to lean in a little bit more to our channel to help.

“The channel is a massive audience, and we're doubling down on how much we're investing in the channel so it can get the name of N-able and the excellent solutions that we have into the ears and minds of small, medium sized businesses across the globe.

“Our history at N-able has been focusing only on managed service providers. We’re now beginning to bring in more of these value added resellers into our community and helping them.

“The lines are a lot more blurred. What was a reseller yesterday is now an MSP and vice versa.

“So we're investing a good amount, putting more boots on the ground, so that way these resellers can better provide that guidance and make sure N-able is part of that equation when they're talking to CIOs or CISOs in these mid-market companies and small medium enterprises.”

His final point involves providing more of a tailored approach for MSPs.

“An MSP that’s $100m in turnover versus an MSP that’s $10m in turnover have different needs.

“And so we're investing more in customer success with more of a tailored approach so the customers get what they want.

“We've invested more in technologists so that our people can work side by side with managed service providers and internal IT departments and help diagnose what's going on there, help them with their automation and scripting.”

Partners, focus on cyber resilience

N-able works with thousands of partners in the UK, one of its top three global markets alongside the US and DACH region.

Pagliuca states if there is one area he wants British partners to focus their energy on, its cyber resilience.

“I want to make sure that when our partners are talking to the mid-size market, they’re talking to a regional bank in the UK, or an accounting practice and they're starting with the cyber resilience story.

“Making sure their customers are protecting their data, making sure that they have layered security and making sure they're properly diagnosing, detecting and responding to threats.

“And if they do that, the UK's market will be a safer place in the UK.”

Partner challenges

As a more than 12-year industry veteran, Pagliuca asserts that many of the sector’s obstacles remain the same for channel partners - finding and retaining top talent, and finding additional customers that fit their profile.

“MSPs can find business, but it’s about finding the right kind of business. The customers that are bought into the same mindset on a layered security approach.

“The good news is, with N-able, we're leveraging AI and automation so our MSPs and VARs can do more with less.

“Their people don't have to do a bunch of the mundane tasks.That means a much more satisfied workforce, and so they can retain their customers, and then hopefully they can spend more time dealing with that second problem of finding new customers.

“Labour scarcity also lies in the expertise.

“I don’t believe MSPs should invest in building their own SOC because that’s expensive. And with labour scarcity that could be a challenge.”