Initial findings from the upcoming report Small Business Wi-Fi: The MSP Networking & Security Requirements
Wi-Fi has become the most consequential piece of small-business technology infrastructure. Point-of-sale, voice, security cameras, cloud productivity, payment terminals, and a steadily growing fleet of connected devices all sit on top of it. And the people deciding which platform actually goes on the wall are, in the vast majority of cases, not the business owner. They are Managed Service Providers (MSPs). A new study examines how MSPs evaluate, buy, deploy, and live with small- and mid-sized business (SMB) Wi-Fi platforms, and what it would take to move them away from the vendor they use today.
The study draws on 47 MSP touchpoints from a national survey and a series of in-depth interviews, and examines vendor selection, support quality, channel economics, integration requirements, and switching behavior. The full report, Small Business Wi-Fi: The MSP Networking & Security Requirements, will be available soon. Below are the themes coming through clearly enough to share now, with the underlying numbers, vendor scorecards, and feature-by-feature comparisons reserved for the published edition.
1. Ubiquiti owns the SMB shelf, but the relationship is shallow
Ubiquiti is, by a wide margin, the dominant access point vendor among the MSPs in this study, with a clear majority running it as their primary platform. The recipe is familiar: competitive pricing, no licensing fees, a serviceable cloud console. The complaints are also consistent across the survey verbatims and the interviews, and they cluster around the same two themes: limited direct support and almost no real channel partnership. As one survey respondent put it: "License-free, one pane of glass management. Unfortunately, they aren’t really channel-friendly." The report sizes the share, ranks the gaps, and shows where each leading competitor either closes or widens them.
2. Support is the #1 selection criterion AND the #1 pain point
Support is universal. Effectively, every survey respondent rated support quality as important when selecting a vendor, and the large majority of interviewed MSPs ranked it as their top partner priority. It is also the single most-cited frustration with the vendor that those same MSPs use today. The message rhymed across both samples: "We will use a more expensive vendor to get better support." What MSPs actually mean by good support is more specific than the marketing copy suggests: phone access, fast response, Service Level Agreements (SLAs), responsive Return Merchandise Authorization (RMA) handling, and a named account contact. The report ranks these requirements and benchmarks each major vendor against them.
3. Cloud management is non-negotiable; integrations are table stakes
Multi-tenant cloud management is no longer a differentiator. Every MSP in the sample expects it. The real fight has moved one layer up: how cleanly the platform plugs into the rest of the MSP stack. The integrations MSPs flagged as required are not surprising once you see the list: security and monitoring tools, Professional Services Automation (PSA) platforms such as HaloPSA, Autotask, and ConnectWise, Remote Monitoring and Management (RMM) platforms, and identity providers such as Microsoft Entra ID. The report maps which vendors integrate cleanly with which platforms, and which gaps are quietly costing deals.
4. Compliance verticals are the soft underbelly of the market
On both sides of the study, compliance-driven verticals dominate the customer mix: healthcare, financial services, legal, and manufacturing. Network isolation came out as the highest-priority feature tested in the survey, with most respondents rating it at the top of the scale. Virtual Local Area Network (VLAN) requirements range from a handful in simple deployments to many dozens in healthcare. Most SMB-priced Wi-Fi platforms do not scale that range cleanly. That gap is the clearest white space the combined data set surfaces, and the report works through which vendors are credibly positioned to fill it.
5. Channel discipline matters more than feature checklists
When asked what would actually move them, the MSPs in the combined sample did not ask for exotic features. They asked for a working commercial model. The headline switching triggers are predictable in shape, less so in priority: better price and value, ease of management, better support, and better performance. On the commercial side, the strong majority want a Monthly Recurring Revenue (MRR) model and margin-based pricing. The specifics, including the margin bands MSPs expect on hardware versus software, the pricing structures they prefer (Wi-Fi-as-a-Service, hardware-plus-license, per-location, per-endpoint), and channel behaviors such as Minimum Advertised Price (MAP) policies, deal registration, no direct-to-consumer sales, and no Amazon distribution, are documented in detail in the channel-program section of the report.
6. The other story in the data is Datto/Kaseya
If Ubiquiti is the value-and-frustration story on the access point side, Datto and Kaseya, now operating as a single combined stack, are the ecosystem-and-lock-in story on the operations side. A meaningful share of the MSPs in the sample are running the full Kaseya/Datto suite, with the Professional Services Automation (PSA) platform (Autotask, formerly Datto PSA), Remote Monitoring and Management (RMM) tools (Datto RMM, Kaseya VSA), backup, security, and Datto networking gear all tied together. Once that stack is in place, the networking decision stops being a standalone evaluation. Alarms route through one ticketing system, billing through one PSA, dashboards through one console. Replacing only the access points is an option in name only.
That changes how a competing Wi-Fi vendor has to think about the opportunity. Direct displacement is rare. The realistic plays are coexistence, partial-stack entry, and waiting for the natural moments when an MSP reconsiders the whole toolchain (acquisition, growth, a renewal cliff, a pricing change). The report unpacks the Kaseya/Datto footprint: which MSPs are most exposed, where the integration touchpoints really matter, what the practical lock-in mechanisms look like in day-to-day operations, and the playbook a networking vendor can use to win business inside a Kaseya/Datto shop instead of around it.
7. Switching is gradual, not a rip-and-replace
Even outside the Kaseya/Datto orbit, the broader pattern is the same. A subset of the interviewed MSPs is openly shopping. A larger group is interested but constrained. The rest are not moving. Several survey respondents explicitly said they would not displace an installed vendor across an existing client base. The realistic entry path is timing rather than displacement: new client deployments and the natural hardware refresh cycle, with explicit focus on MSPs actively dissatisfied with their current vendor and growing MSPs that have not yet standardized. The report segments the sample by purchase readiness and outlines the practical openings over the next 18 months.
What the full report delivers
This report provides a comprehensive analysis of the SMB managed Wi-Fi market, combining primary research from 37 MSP surveys and 10 in-depth interviews with extensive secondary research on market dynamics and vendor positioning. The report delivers five-year market sizing and forecasts, detailed competitive profiles of leading vendors, including Ubiquiti, Cisco Meraki, Aruba Instant On, Kaseya/Datto Networking, TP-Link Omada, Cambium Networks, and Calix, along with a feature-by-feature comparison matrix. Channel program analysis covers margin structures, partner tiers, and support-quality benchmarking, while integration ecosystem mapping identifies RMM/PSA compatibility and API capabilities that are critical to MSP adoption. The report also examines emerging technology trends, including Wi-Fi 7 readiness, AI-driven network management, and zero-trust architectures, concluding with strategic recommendations for vendors, MSPs, and channel programs seeking to compete in this rapidly evolving market.
At a glance, you get:
- Five-year market sizing and forecasts for SMB managed Wi-Fi.
- Vendor profiles for Ubiquiti, Cisco Meraki, Aruba Instant On, Kaseya/Datto Networking, TP-Link Omada, Cambium Networks, and Calix, plus a feature-by-feature comparison matrix.
- Channel program analysis: margin structures, partner tiers, and support-quality benchmarking.
- Integration ecosystem mapping covering Remote Monitoring and Management (RMM) and Professional Services Automation (PSA) compatibility, and the Application Programming Interface (API) capabilities MSPs actually require.
- A read on emerging tech that will reshape the segment: Wi-Fi 7 readiness, AI-driven network management, and zero-trust architectures.
- Strategic recommendations for vendors, MSPs, and channel programs competing in this market.
Pre-order the report
The report is available now for pre-order through the Maravedis shop. Pre-order pricing is the lowest you will see on this title, and pre-order subscribers receive the executive summary the day it ships, ahead of the public release.
Pre-order the report: https://shop.maravedis-bwa.com/products/small-business-wi-fi-the-msp-networking-security-requirements
Questions before you pre-order? Email me directly at afellah@maravedis-bwa.com.
The bottom line
The SMB Wi-Fi market has a dominant player that wins on value and loses on partnership, a premium player whose licensing model is actively pushing MSPs away, a Kaseya/Datto stack that holds a meaningful slice of the channel through ecosystem lock-in rather than product superiority, and a quiet pile of compliance-vertical demand that nobody is fully serving. Whichever side of the table you sit on (vendor, channel, MSP), the next 18 months are going to reward the players who read this market correctly. We built this report so you can be one of them.
See you inside the data.