Michael George discussed the evolution and future of Syncro, a company he joined in early 2024. Syncro aims to create a world-class RMM and PSA combined platform, leveraging the significant market share of Microsoft in the small to medium business sector. George highlighted the upcoming announcement of a new product category at the Kaseya conference, focusing on simplifying IT stacks and enhancing security. He emphasized the importance of AI in cybersecurity and the need for MSPs to stay ahead of evolving threats. George also mentioned Syncro's presence in Austin, Texas, and his personal experiences living between Boston and Naples, Florida.
“New year, new kicks—courtesy of my kids trying to make me hip. Bless their optimism.”
Syncro Links:
https://syncromsp.com/platform/
Harry Brelsford 00:00
Hey, nation, nation, we're back with Michael George, good lord. You know good calling. Miss Mully, we go back about 10 years. How you doing? Michael
Michael George 00:10
Harry, I'm doing great, really. We go back even maybe as many as 15 years together in shape or form. So it's great to be with you again.
Harry Brelsford 00:19
Yeah, I know. So let's talk Syncro again. I'm trying to bring up CRM, I can't find it, but kind of knew some of the early founders in San Luis, Obispo, California, right? I mean, that's very nice, very nice place. What's going on?
Michael George 00:41
Well, yeah, like, like, any great business, there were some founding entrepreneurs that had a dream and did a really nice job building out that dream. They wanted to build a world class both RMM and PSA combined, and all in one platform, and lo and behold, they did. And like a couple of maybe young kids out surfing on windsurfers or kite boards, they caught just the right winds, and that business took off. And it got to a place where it got a little bit bigger, and then they were really capable of handling or managing so they actually did the right thing. Some of them are still involved in some ways. I have one member still on my board, Robert Reichman, absolutely terrific individual, great entrepreneur, but also knew he was not the right person to take the business to the next level and scale it so it everybody. It's just like different funding elements, you know, leaders, more often than not, kind of the successful ones outgrow their own capacity to continue at that scale right? Yeah,
Harry Brelsford 02:02
yeah, we do. That took me a long time to learn. You know, it's, it's, it's a tough pill to take, but that's exactly right.
Michael George 02:14
Yeah, no.
Harry Brelsford 02:16
So where, where are you at? What? What's the roadmap? What's what's going on? What? What's news?
Michael George 02:23
Well, there's a lot going on. I joined the company a little bit more than a year ago, beginning of 2024 and we knew that there was a certain opportunity, a certain time or place, that the market was going to have a massive tectonic shift. And lo and behold, that shift has been underway now for probably the better part of two years. The good news is we didn't. We're not stepping in too late, and we do. You know, I brought in a number of individuals that I had the privilege to work with in my journey when I was the CEO of continuum, yep. And dzf, for instance, was my chief product officer there. She's our chief product officer here. And a whole bunch of other folks that are really talented and understand these market dynamics. And so we're, we're capitalizing on the next absolutely transformational Tamil shift, you know, taking place in this, you know, get into with you further, but, but that's, you know, once, one step at a time here.
Harry Brelsford 03:32
Oh, yeah, yeah, and congratulations. I mean, that's, you know, that's good on you. Are you still in Boston? I recall you're on the East Coast.
Michael George 03:43
I am, yeah, good memory. I we're, you know, I'm based out of the Boston area, and we spend much of our we spend much of our summers there and on Cape Cod, and we spend our winters in Naples, Florida. So we're, we're not snowbirds, we're sunbirds. Now my wife and I,
Harry Brelsford 04:05
yeah, yeah, no, I get it. I get it. So in the announcements coming up, you know, q2 what? What can you share?
Michael George 04:18
Sure, I'm happy to we're going to be announcing, and by the time this is broadcast, we will have announced in the last week of the month of April from the saya conference that we have essentially a new product category that is a consolidation of some of the existing categories that are out there today. The atonic shift I'm referring to is really, is really this Microsoft is, you know, makes up 98% of the operating system of the entire small to medium business market. Harry and I. This has always been true, right? Every every MSP and every IT professional, are Microsoft certified, and we have watched them slowly, even during my continuum days, which ended at the end of 2019 when Thoma Bravo decided to merge connect wise and continuum. These were two assets that they owned, and so they made that choice to do so. But even at that time, we were watching Microsoft slowly close in on the platform, the tooling side of this business. And so when I reemerged in this market category, it became crystal clear that the opportunity for a company like us was to close that gap. They're a channel company, as you know, 100% channel, yeah, and the only products you can buy directly from Microsoft or like, you know, their Xbox and things that they might sell in their retail operation, but as a commercial enterprise, you know, selling to businesses, they sell through the channel, and so they are in need of companies like us that understand these dynamics and are building, you know, a two tier distribution model, and have on our mm and a PSA already that we can close the gap on their products to bring them to market, to now enable MSPs to do essentially two things. One is, is to simplify their stack. Everybody already has Microsoft, they just don't have the ability to fully utilize it or to benefit from its capabilities. Number one and number two is, we're providing a more secure environment because the market's been forced to layer up various security products, because there isn't any one you know, that's been able to provide a fully secure and safe environment. And to be clear, there is no such thing as 100% secure. I mean, it's just right. We still have employees that do stupid things, and so, you know, and Microsoft or you or I or nobody can control some of those activities. But if we simplify the stack and we don't have all these layering components that have competing functions, then we have a much better chance, in fact, the best chance to provide the most secure environment is if you can rely on the one hot, you know, security solution that handles sort of an end to end, you know, EDR and MDR capability with a sock so that you can remediate, you know, In the event that there is any level of penetration. So, so again, we're we're really in the business of helping and enabling MSPs to utilize licenses they already have from Microsoft, the certifications they already have for Microsoft to provide a much simpler stack, reduce all of these other products that are creating all this complexity, and do so in every other area in in particular, in the area of security. Yeah,
Harry Brelsford 08:35
yeah, I get it. I you know, off air, I told you I'm helping a not for profit is a passion project, and we don't have the the cybersecurity protection we need. I'm not going to name them, but the point is, Michael, very common, very common in SMB, right? Everybody's kind of a little bit on the downside with with cyber.
Michael George 09:13
Oh yeah, no, I, I fully agree. Look, it's a complex it's a complex category to solve for. And in fact, at some level, it's an unsolvable problem, right? You're on this asymptotic curve, and you're trying to outpace the bad guys. And I've even heard people in the MSP space really dismiss the power and the capabilities, for instance, of AI, agentic AI and just AI in every dimension. And look, you know, you can dismiss it as, you know, headline news making, you know, chatter and all kinds of stuff. But the fact of the matter is, is the bad guys? Are using AI, and they're increasing their number of attack points and and therefore increasing the attack surface to the, you know, to the small to medium business market. So I think unless you you know people, you have to pay attention to this stuff. And I know nobody loves to be on the bleeding edge of things, but it's necessary to be at least on the leading edge of the security envelope, because it, you know, you can just be a click or two behind Harry and all of a sudden, you've got, you know, a series of ransomware issues underway in your customer base. And you know, there are two things that drive a small to medium business to leave one MSP and go to another. And the number one thing is a security incident. If they have a security incident, it puts a big question in their mind about their service provider. And then the second most critical thing is how quickly they are able to remediate it, isolate it and remediate it. Those are the number one and number two, reasons why somebody fires one MSP and goes to the next. That's why employees in internal it get terminated. Is, is, is because of this so, so it is a security first industry. And you know, we are really in the business of providing the most fail safe environment at end, a remediation model that and we are not announcing the SOC capabilities at the Kaseya conference necessarily, but you will see a lot of things that we're doing in and around the defender and Sentinel world with Microsoft that is providing a very, very secure environment. And, you know, there are plenty of ways to get some MDR, you know capabilities, sure, sure, you know as well.
Harry Brelsford 12:26
Hey, hey, final question, and let's, let's touch base later in the year, always a pleasure. But the final question, and again, you remember, I'm a little chippy now that I live in Austin. So you know, maybe you picked up on that, but I'm a little chippy. But when you get a hit, Austin, man, Austin, I'm assuming you've been here. It's, it's a nice town, dude,
Michael George 12:54
it's a, it's a lovely town. And only because you asked, I'll be there on Tuesday. No, no kidding, I'd be, I'd be, I get there often. It's a great tech center. It's a great, I mean, it's great in a number of dimensions. But there is a lot of, you know, there's a lot in the way of technology people, talent. We employ a number of people there. And, oh,
Harry Brelsford 13:21
you do. Oh, okay, I didn't know you had people
Michael George 13:26
here. Fair enough, yeah, so only because you asked I'll be there Tuesday, Harry,
Harry Brelsford 13:30
yeah, yeah. Well, you know, I'll have to clear the calendar, but we'll, we'll catch you one of these visits. But you know, the thing about Austin is, you know, 32 years in Seattle, Seattle got big, right? Seattle got large, and Austin, to me, to this day, just had this talk last week. I was said nerdiocon, great conference, by the way. But Austin is basically Portland, right? We're a little bit smaller, so it's, it's cool.
Michael George 14:11
I think it's a great I think it's a great city, and in in every dimension I love it. Yeah, all right, for you. But anyway, anything else I could do to help or, you know, cover for you, I we covered, I think some good ground. But yeah, I always love to provide things of thought, leadership and value to your to your readership, so nothing is off limits with you. Harry, if there's anything else you'd like to know? I'm happy to
Harry Brelsford 14:42
appreciate you. Appreciate you. Let's stay in touch. We'll we'll meet up soon. No problem. Great. Okay, great.
Michael George 14:50
Thank you very much, Harry, thanks so much. Really appreciate the time with you all the best.