What is the Difference Between a Cloud Service Provider and a Managed Service Provider?

Learn about the differences between cloud service providers (CSPs) & managed service providers (MSPs). Understand how CSPs & MSPs can help improve operational efficiency & reduce costs.

What is the Difference Between a Cloud Service Provider and a Managed Service Provider?

At the most basic level, the main difference between a cloud service provider (CSP) and a managed service provider (MSP) is that MSPs manage their own proprietary technology and infrastructure, while CSPs provide access to their own proprietary technology and infrastructure. The choice between an MSP or CSP depends on your current capabilities, growth plans, and business needs. A traditional data center is on-premises, hardware-based, and stores data within a local network. This means that your MSP must perform updates, monitoring, and maintenance in-house, which can slow down processes and lead to inefficiency.

The cloud is located in an off-premises data center and stores data anywhere via the Internet. It is redundant, so your cloud MSP can perform all updates, monitoring, and maintenance from any location, making things faster and more efficient. Additionally, cloud MSPs can protect availability during outages since cloud providers have multiple data centers in multiple geographical locations. Managed services also offer businesses a fixed monthly fee for services that provide high-quality services.

This may be a managed service of the public cloud provider; for example, a known example is a database managed in the public cloud. Cloud and managed services help improve operational efficiency by automating key IT processes such as implementing code and managing the cloud. Cloud computing involves transferring IT resources to a cloud service provider that makes its technology available to a company. Cloud computing and managed services work on the same principle and idea but approach their initial processes and offerings differently.

If you've ever claimed that there's no difference between managed IT services and cloud computing, you're wrong. Next-Generation AWS Managed Service Providers (MSPs) Address Cloud Knowledge and Skills Gaps of Many One of the biggest challenges facing IT leaders right now is talent management, including heavy resignation, talent retention, and some skill gaps. While all cloud service providers are managed service providers, most managed services are made up of a series of cloud services (also known as tools) if it is something that is built on the public cloud. An IT department, including staff and equipment, can be very costly for a company; by using a managed service provider, expenses can be efficiently managed to forecast costs every month. Managed service providers (MSPs) in the cloud play a key role in helping organizations recognize and take advantage of these advantages.

Lynne Ellert
Lynne Ellert

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