John Reynders and the Your.Cloud team receive the Dutch IT Channel Editors Choice Award

Your.Cloud’s ambition does not lie: to become the largest MSP platform in the whole of Europe. It started in 2017 with an initial acquisition by TSH, as Your.Cloud was called until 2023. Using a ‘buy & build’ strategy, the MSP then expanded into a platform with more than 25 companies in the Netherlands, Germany and, more recently, the UK. Reynders calls Your.Cloud a “family” of MSP companies, of entrepreneurs who have a place there to take their business to the next level. “Family you are forever, which fits with our investment philosophy of ‘buy & hold forever’,” he explains on a Wednesday morning at the office in Amsterdam-Buitenveldert. “We don’t buy companies for a few years.”

Stronger together

Rather, Reynders, who gained a wealth of (leadership) experience at Visma and Microsoft and has been pulling the cart at Your.Cloud since August 2023, lets the member MSPs grow together by strengthening each other. “If we want to become number one in Europe, we need to learn from each other. That is my main task as CEO, that there is clarity on that. I encourage our companies to share everything, and we have a central team that sees what smart things are happening in the companies, so that that knowledge becomes available to all MSPs. In that respect, it’s great that our MSPs are so different, which we maintain with an eminently decentralised culture in which each company keeps its identity and brand, has its own go-to-market and continues to do what it does best. An MSP within Your.Cloud who needs help can always turn to a ‘family member’ with a different specialisation.”

It is great that our MSPs are so different, which we maintain with an eminently decentralised culture in which each company retains its identity and brand, has its own go-to-market and continues to do what it does best.

The collaboration Reynders envisions is exactly what allows member MSPs to flourish. “For example, a Director Major Shareholder (DGA) of an MSP is hugely technology-driven, but struggles with the commercial side: how do I communicate the value of everything I have developed in my company to my customers? Your.Cloud does not take over the commercial side, but helps this organisation improve on its own merits based on best practices from other companies.”

Security and AI

On the contrary, another DGA finds it difficult to keep up with technology or investments in it.

“The best example is cyber security. Cyber criminals nowadays form multinational, highly professional organisations that operate on an unprecedented scale. An MSP with less than 100 employees cannot always (fully) afford the investments in knowledge and technology required for this. Your.Cloud has built a cyber security operations centre (SOC) that operates 24/7 and makes security services continuously available to all Your.Cloud companies. SME customers in particular – who are especially vulnerable – want their trusted MSP to be able to keep doing everything and not require yet another new, specialised security partner.”

Your.Cloud has built a cyber security operations centre (SOC) that operates 24/7 and makes security services continuously available to all Your.Cloud companies.

Also with the deployment of new technologies such as AI, Your.Cloud’s MSPs can help each other and make them better. Reynders: “We invest centrally in this, with a dedicated test team. And if an MSP wants to broaden – a company started in telecommunications, for example, and wants to expand to a more complete ICT portfolio – then, by very actively connecting the networks of our companies, we can create a unique, safe environment, in which all the knowledge relevant to such a next phase is present. After all, it is easier to talk to a fellow managing director in the same family than to a competitor.”

Communities

Disciplines such as commerce, customer support, platform and HR all have a ‘community’ at Your.Cloud. “If you work at an MSP affiliated with Your.Cloud, you benefit from the connection with Your.Cloud as a whole and are always in at least one community,” Reynders clarifies. “We bring leaders in specific functions together physically, to let them get to know, trust, inspire and challenge each other. We have developed a digital platform, the Your.Cloud Universe, where all 1,500 employees can share ‘cool stuff’ in their community very easily. This is how I want to generate energy and build a culture that makes us stronger as a whole. Remember: we provide technology-driven services, but the basis of our success is in human capital. A lot of my energy therefore goes into developing the leaders within our companies.”

Team effort

And John Reynders does that well, according to the editors of Dutch IT Channel who awarded him this prize. Reynders, an extremely studious person with a passion for both technology and people, is happy with the Editors’ Choice Award, but sees it mainly as a tribute to the entire Your.Cloud team. “My face may be the most visible, but countless people next to me make just as much of a difference every day. We do it together. This award fits my vision of leadership, as ‘bottom fries in the chip bag’. I see it as a team award that we can all be incredibly proud of.”