New company Sparxent targets mid-market with enterprise-class IT services 21 September, 2008 By Erin Bell

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DeWindt was formerly Director of Worldwide Reseller Sales at Intel, Co-President of Computer 2000 AG, CEO of AmeriQuest Technologies, and Co-Founder of BlueRoads. Taylor spent 15 years at Intel spin-off LANDesk Software as part of the original management team, and prior to that held positions at Intel and Microsoft.

Sparxent was founded on the premise that the current VAR model for mid-market could be better serving the segment. For example, rather than mid-market companies having to choose between VARs with deep expertise in a single vendor's solution or VARs that sell a broad range of software but have little expertise in creating integrated solutions, Sparxent's approach will be to consult with customers to deliver the idea solution regardless of vendor or delivery model.

"Although the middle tier of the market makes up nearly half of overall IT spending, there are few dedicated IT resources focused on this segment," said DeWindt. "We feel that there is a unique opportunity to create a new business model through the marriage of consulting, solutions, integration, development and services that are solely focused on the under-served mid-market."

According to Taylor, enterprise-class consultancies like Accenture, Capgemini or IBM Global Services provide consulting services to larger enterprises, but at present there's no similar service available to mid-market customers in the 500 to 1,000 employee range.

"The mid-market is full of VARs that represent one specific technology. They're happy to sit down and talk to customers about how to implement that technology in their environment, but there's nobody who can take a broad-ranging overview and say, 'It's not actually a technology solution you need, it's just better processes and better training on how to actually implement the technology in your environment,'" said Taylor. "And so we founded Sparxent really to become the IBM Global Services specifically for mid-market customers."

To make that happen, Sparxent is pursuing a number of global acquisitions of service providers that serve the mid-market with very specific capabilities.

The company's first two acquisitions are U.S.-based systems management reseller NetworkD, and Moscow-based Arbyte, which adds help desk and Microsoft Dynamics AX expertise.

"Joining with Sparxent gives us access to new markets and additional resources as well as a laser focus on delivering enterprise-class IT services to mid-sized customers," said Ashley Leonard, CEO of NetworkD. "We are excited to become a Sparxent company and expand the breadth and depth of services we can offer to customers."

Taylor said Sparxent is next looking to acquire companies with managed services and software hosting capabilities to address the fact that the mid-market has a dramatic preference towards leasing its technology rather than buying it outright.

"By acquiring established, local IT providers around the globe and bringing them together under one umbrella, Sparxent will act as a single source for IT  providing the broadest array of expertise and tools to the middle market," said Taylor. "The key to our comprehensive approach is to bridge the gap between VARs that lack the software competency to provide true integration and software development companies that are not equipped to provide a breadth of consulting services."