Play It Smart

Noah Landow co-founded Macktez in 1996 and is still running it, still independent, and still deliberately not built like the rest of the industry. Most managed service providers (MSPs) chase one stack across every client because that is what scales. Noah spent 25 years reluctant to use the label at all, because his clients cannot be standardised: nonprofits, cultural institutions, organizations in the middle of a build, and a public park in the middle of the Hudson River.

We get into the mechanics. How he staffs jobs where the delivery date beats the supply chain. Why he keeps a closet of decommissioned switches and a cabling team on the payroll. What his recurring revenue number actually means once you strip out the five-year projects billed as subscriptions. And how a firm with no outside money reads the private equity money now moving through the channel.

What we cover:

- Taking jobs where the deadline cannot move, and phasing the network in anyway
- Buying equipment six months early against a nonprofit's three-year budget
- Keeping cabling in-house with almost no temporary staff
- The 25 years he called it IT consulting instead of managed services
- Co-managed work as a live negotiation over who does which step
- What the 65 to 70 percent recurring figure hides
- The three business units: managed services, consulting, physical installation
- Where clients come from after 30 years, and the window in which a buyer is reachable
- A two-year evaluation cycle before changing a ticketing system
- Why JumpCloud changed the shape of the work
- Thirty calls with private equity and venture groups, and what he makes of them
- Single-vendor lock-in and what it costs to leave

Noah Landow: https://noahlandow.com
Macktez: https://macktez.com

What is Play It Smart?

Play It Smart is the show where Alexej Pikovsky sits down with MSP operators and business owners and takes apart how they actually do it: winning clients, pricing, staying lean, using AI, and building toward an exit worth having. Season 2 is dedicated to MSP operators. Past guests include Rand Fishkin of Moz and SparkToro and the founders of Chili Piper, Flowchat and 3DLOOK.