Can AI level the MSP playing field?

Kinetic IT’s Murray Thompson expects democratised app development to make some big changes in the IT services industry.

Thompson, a former Major General in the Australian Army, joined Kinetic as group executive of advisory and transformation in July.

He spoke to techpartner.news at the 2025 TechLeaders conference where artificial intelligence (AI) was central to much of the discussion.

Thompson said that one area he sees AI is bringing major changes in is the acceleration of low and no code app development.

“The fastest growing coding language in the world is English,” he pointed out.

“Now, everyone can sit in their room and code for themselves with these new platforms where you can do low- and no-code. You tailor that to your business requirement and every one of us, skilled or not skilled, in the future will do that themselves."

Kinetic IT and its peers will ensure IT environments are running and secure, while users across a business create applications to suit their needs, Thompson predicted.

That future is “some years away”, he said, but added that democratisation could also have implications for smaller managed services providers.

The rise of automation for tier one service desk matters has been highlighted as a barrier to staying competitive for smaller managed services providers, but advancements in AI could help mitigate some of that pressure.

Thompson said the rate of change in tech means that what might be confined to the largest companies now, will soon become accessible to smaller players.

He made the analogy to his first attempt at building a chatbot in early-2017.

“It failed just because … I wasn't that knowledgeable about how to do it," he explained.

"A decade later, you can get a better outcome (with LLMs) than with people sitting on the service desk. They work really well and they’ll only continue to improve.”

He added that whatever happens with the future of AI, having the appropriate systems in place will still be vital.

“I can have the best AI agent in the world, but unless I've got infrastructure that it can operate on, unless I can provide it with access to data, etc., it’s sort of a waste of time," he told techpartner.news.

"It's not getting any insights, it may not be cyber secure and things like that."

Regardless of where the tech goes, Thompson pointed out that the human element will remain central to success in IT services.

“It's so important to actually build a nice, strong, collegiate relationship with each of your clients, where you are looked at as a valued member of a team," he said.

"Our team members, first and foremost, identify with the business they're supporting, and you want that because you want them to feel invested in the business and mission of each of those businesses, not just an external agent."