Rising hardware prices, growing cost pressures, and changes in the virtualization market are forcing system integrators to rethink their strategies. At its flagship event in Sofia, Acronis positioned itself with a clear offering for its channel partners. The company presented key innovations for the channel, including a revamped partner program. The message: those who want to thrive in the AI era must adapt, but significant business opportunities await.
Acronis CEO Jan-Jaap “JJ” Jager opened the event with a status quo assessment. AI is not changing the direction of the IT industry; rather, “what makes AI so special is its speed. We are currently experiencing more innovation and at a faster pace than ever before.” The previous shift from on-premises to cloud migration took years, whereas everything in AI evolves at breakneck speed.
How fast is evident within Acronis itself: within just a few months, AI usage noticeably boosted development productivity at Acronis by an impressive 50%, according to Jager. Notably, a majority of developers self-reported that they still do not fully trust AI-generated results. Consequently, governance, accountability, and control are more critical than ever.
For Jager, this means one primary thing: “MSPs must rethink their business model.” It is no longer just about products or infrastructure, but about becoming customers’ “Trusted Advisors”—especially since many users urgently require expert guidance on implementing AI. No one today can predict where the technology will lead, making it all the more essential to guide customers through uncertainty.
Compounding the pressure for MSPs: hardware component costs across the industry are trending in only one direction—upwards. This reality forces partners to operate more efficiently. This is precisely where Acronis aims to step in: providing a platform that unifies automation, security, and infrastructure management, rather than retrofitting isolated AI tools.
The $700 Billion Opportunity
According to an IDC estimate cited by Rob Rae, Corporate Vice President of Community and Partner Experience at cloud marketplace Pax8, the addressable market volume for partner business stands at approximately $700 billion. Yet it is barely tapped: according to Acronis, only one in ten MSPs currently operates on an agent-based and autonomous basis. Jager also acknowledged that only about ten percent of partners utilize AI according to the new business model, with most simply lacking practical experience. To change this, Acronis invests a double-digit million sum in AI development year after year to equip its roughly 21,000 partners worldwide.
Jager highlighted the current data explosion as a major opportunity, transforming MSPs into key custodians and security managers of growing data volumes. This aligns with many customers’ demand for data sovereignty. Partners confirmed this trend from field experience: Angel Atanasov, founder of Bulgarian MSP DCD-IT, reported that AI simplifies business scaling and shifts focus away from pure administrative tasks toward core operations.
Remarkably, there remains a training gap among partners. Continuous education is not a new topic. “You would be surprised how many partners do not even know the most basic things, such as two-factor authentication,” noted the Acronis CEO. AI raises additional questions and exacerbates existing deficiencies.
Open Source Advantages
Acronis founder Serg Bell no longer holds an official role within the company. Instead, he now heads the Constructor Group and introduced the “Constructor Fabric”—an open-source foundation designed to operate generative AI in a controlled manner with clear guardrails. Several Acronis projects already use the Fabric as a technical foundation. The core concept: governance, metrics, and optimization must not be retrofitted onto generative AI, but built in from the start. He emphasized the importance of open source as a foundation for innovation, enabling faster and more flexible development than proprietary software.
Together with Acronis, Constructor is developing an ecosystem aiming to reach over one million developers by 2027. For MSPs, open source and AI promise more efficient processes and greater control over code deployment.
Paul Maritz, former CEO of VMware and longtime Acronis Chairman of the Board, provided strategic context on current market developments. The AI market is shifting from a few large language models to a multitude of specialized models of varying sizes. The decisive factor moving forward will be who controls the models and their execution environments. Consequently, security architecture and access control become prerequisites for any production-ready AI deployment.
Cyber Console as an MSP Booster
The name of the Sofia event set the stage: “Acronis Accelerate: The Journey to Autonomous IT.” The focus was on moving toward automated, independent IT powered by AI-driven building blocks. The centerpiece is the Cyber Console, acting as a unified interface for users and AI agents. It is complemented by Cyber Intelligence for identifying security risks and business opportunities, Service Desk for automated ticket workflows, and Cyber Studio for creating custom agent workflows using natural language. All components rest on a unified AI platform—not a patchwork of standalone tools, but an end-to-end ecosystem designed to relieve MSPs and unlock new revenue streams.
New Partner Program
A key announcement of the day was the evolution of the “Acronis Cyber Partner Program.” According to the company, this is the industry’s first product-led partner program integrated directly into the Acronis Cyber Platform rather than functioning as a standalone portal. The goal is to automate partner workflows and tightly connect technology with business operations.
Key elements highlighted by Acronis include an AI-driven Business Intelligence feature that pinpoints growth and revenue opportunities for partners, as well as a credit-based billing model for product and service usage. The system features an AI-driven points structure: certifications will directly translate into points or credits, impacting terms and benefits within the program.
When asked about the most important aspect of the new partner program, Jager responded: “We can now serve every partner. We can help accelerate the business of all our partners.”
Conclusion: Advisory Over Administration
The event’s underlying message was clear: Acronis is no longer positioning itself primarily as a backup and security vendor, but as an infrastructure partner for MSPs on the path to autonomous IT. The technological foundation—from Cyber Frame to Constructor Fabric and the new partner program—aims to liberate MSPs from administrative burdens and elevate them into the essential role of Trusted Advisors for the AI era.
Carolina Heyder is a business analyst and moderator with extensive experience in the German and international IT market. She has worked for many years at renowned European trade publishers such as WEKA Fachmedien, Vogel IT Medien, Springer, and Aspencore. She creates content for both web and print media and is an expert in front of the microphone and camera. Thanks to her fluency in German, English, and Spanish, as well as her Chilean roots, she brings a global and intercultural perspective to topics such as cybersecurity, artificial intelligence, digital transformation, sustainability, and other key areas of the IT sector.