Pay Attention to These Growing Industries in 2019

One of the best ways Managed Services Companies can achieve growth is through specializing their service offerings to a specific vertical. The more you entrench yourself in the vertical, the more growth you can achieve. Becoming “experts” with vertical specific technology and getting to know the vendors that supply these products and services will open up more doors and close more sales opportunities creating a “snowball effect.”

The best time to get into one of these verticals is when the industry itself is on the incline, and new technologies are being developed to better service the businesses therein. These “younger” companies will be more open to partnerships to help them support and implement their company or solutions, thus leading to exponential growth for your business should their companies grow. To help you identify some of these up and coming opportunities, we compiled some of the upward trending verticals that expect continued growth through 2019.

Senior Living / Elder Care

The over 77 millions “baby boomers” that were born between the years 1946-64 are reaching the age of requiring elder assistance and care. Construction and development of these facilities has been ramping up over the past several years and appears to continue to increase as this industry expects to continue to grow over the next decade to accommodate the increase in demand.

As the facilities increase in capacity and operating volume, technology will continue to play a part in their efficiency and quality of service. Wearables, smart lighting, telemedicine, and other smart devices will continue to be integrated as these technologies are specialized for the vertical. Being able to consult and provide these specialized solutions and the infrastructure to connect them creates a great demand for your service within the industry.

Co-working / Shared Offices

As the “gig economy” grows and more corporate workers go remote, it has really shaken up the traditional commercial real estate market. Much like the displacement theory of fluid mechanics, this sinking has appeared to push the Co-working and Shared Office industry to the top of the tube as developers and property owners look to fill un-leasable space.

Among all the expensive furnishing and open floor plans of these facilities are hundreds (or sometimes thousands) of endpoints that are primarily connected by WiFi. With this type of heavy use comes a massive need for infrastructure management and support, both of which these companies likely have trouble in-sourcing. Servicing a co-working or shared office company may also open up new doors and their business tenants may need additional technology solutions that you can offer (assuming you are contractually allowed to do so).

Fitness Clubs / Lifestyle

With e-commerce sales continuing to eclipse brick and mortar retail, big box stores and small retail businesses are both closing up shop in a hurry, leaving shopping centers and strip malls completely desolate. Large discount gyms and small fitness studios appear to filling these voids and are showing traction even beyond their typical January surges.

The health and fitness industry is becoming more and more “connected” as people rely heavily on IoT devices to track activity and manage their weight loss. Clubs are now integrating this into their service offerings and even the workout equipment itself is becoming connected, making the technology infrastructure demands of a fitness club significantly greater than they were just a few years ago. For those MSPs “fit” for the challenge, this is sure to create more opportunities.

Outpatient / Urgent Healthcare

The current state of healthcare in the US is creating a pocket of opportunity in between Primary Care Physicians and Emergency Rooms (Hospitals). “Urgent Care”, as it is known, fills this gap with outpatient services meant for faster visits at a lower cost. Since a lot of Americans now have high deductible insurance plans, this is turning out to be a cost efficient alternative to visiting the ER or more convenient than booking an appointment with a busy PCP office.

If you are an MSP that is already going “all in” on the Healthcare vertical, now is the time to identify which of your local providers is opening up Urgent Care facilities and look to piggy back off their growth. Since these locations are meant to service smaller geographic areas than a hospital, a healthcare company will likely open up quite a few of them, most in small-medium retail locations. This creates a frequent need for infrastructure and IT Consulting.

Cannabis / Agriculture

As the discussions around the decriminalization and ensuing regulation of marijuana and cannabis based products are heating up, one can expect an agricultural surge in the US & Canada should these laws pass. With major revenue potential at stake, companies will look to the use of IoT technology to streamline operations and maximize production. These profit-fueled advancements in technology should have an effect on farmers everywhere, regardless of what crops they grow.

A tech driven agricultural industry creates unique opportunities for MSPs to specialize in this vertical and create more growth opportunities for IT companies that are in rural areas. Designing networks that can securely and efficiently cover miles of farmland to pull in data from the fields is no simple task, and those providers who can master it are likely to show great potential for growth.