WEBIT chooses employee ownership for its MSP succession plan
For nearly 30 years, Eric Rieger built WEBIT Services around a simple idea: take care of Chicagoland businesses by being the local IT team they could trust. Then came a decision that had less to do with technology than with legacy.
Rieger needed to step away from the Naperville MSP to focus on his health. That left him facing the question every founder eventually confronts: Who should carry the company forward when you no longer can? He could have sold WEBIT to an outside buyer. Instead, he chose to hand ownership to the people who helped build it.
WEBIT Services announced Sept. 29 that it has become 100% employee-owned through a partnership with Buildkin, a family of employee-owned technology companies. For WEBIT’s customers, the company says very little will change.
For its employees, however, the transition fundamentally changes their relationship with the business now that they have a stake in its future.
MSP succession planning means protecting more than valuation
Rieger founded WEBIT in 1996 and spent nearly three decades building the company into a managed IT provider serving small and midsize organizations across the Chicago area. Its customers span healthcare and dental practices, manufacturing, nonprofits, financial services, and architecture, construction and engineering firms.
Those relationships became part of what Rieger had to protect when he considered his exit. The decision was no longer simply about what the business was worth, but what would happen to the people, clients and culture after he left.
That is a dilemma many MSP owners eventually face.
“Everything in life has to conclude at some point, and the people who don’t realize that are the ones caught off guard,” Dawn Sizer, CEO and co-founder of 3rd Element Consulting, previously told ChannelPro in a discussion about succession planning. Sizer said owners have to think beyond the transaction itself. “It’s not just about you,” she said, pointing to the effect an exit can have on employees, family members and the future of the company.
For Rieger, the answer was employee ownership.
“Eric could have handed this company to a lot of people,” Buildkin CEO Delcie Bean said. “That he chose to hand it to his own employees tells you what he cared about.”
WEBIT wants the ownership change to feel invisible to customers
A change in ownership often creates uncertainty for clients. New leadership can bring new pricing, contracts, systems and expectations. WEBIT is emphasizing the opposite.
Chief Operating Officer Aarin Bailey will continue leading day-to-day operations, as he has for the past several years. Customers will keep working with the same vCIOs, engineers and support contacts. The company says it has no plans to change pricing, service agreements, support processes or ticketing as part of the transition. WEBIT will also keep its name, its Naperville location and its local leadership. The goal is to make one of the biggest changes in the company’s history nearly invisible to customers.
“When the people serving you own the business, the incentive lines up with long-term relationships and long-term reputation,” Bailey said. “That was Eric’s reason for structuring it this way.”
MSP owners have more exit options than selling
MSP owners have more exit options than they sometimes realize. Internal succession can transfer ownership to a partner, family member, longtime employee or broader employee group. An external sale, by contrast, often brings more capital up front but can also introduce uncertainty around culture, staffing and customer relationships.
For some owners, those trade-offs determine the entire strategy.
Sizer previously told ChannelPro that her company had deliberately avoided pursuing a sale to a venture capital firm or another MSP because leadership worried that an acquirer could dismantle parts of the business or cherry-pick clients. Instead, 3rd Element Consulting identified internal employees interested in eventually taking over.
Other MSP leaders have reached the same conclusion from a different direction.
Corey Kirkendoll, president and CEO of 5K Technical Services, said joining a peer group forced him to think seriously about what he wanted his business to become “when it grew up.” Before that, he had only a vague idea that his children might eventually inherit the company or that a board could run it.
“Very few of us have that leadership and business mindset to plan ahead,” Kirkendoll said. “You’re always working in the business — and not on the business.”
WEBIT’s transition shows what that planning can look like when the founder’s goal centers on continuity rather than simply finding a buyer.
A new custodian takes over at WEBIT
Bean has assumed the CEO role at WEBIT. He brings more than two decades of experience in managed IT services and previously founded a 100% employee-owned MSP in Massachusetts.
Bean and Rieger have also known each other for more than 10 years. That history helps explain why Bean describes his role less as reinventing WEBIT and more as protecting what Rieger already built.
“My job is to be a careful custodian of what he built and to keep the promises he made,” Bean said.
WEBIT will now operate as part of Buildkin alongside other employee-owned technology businesses, including custom software and SaaS developer Upstream Impact, Massachusetts-based MSP Paragus IT and AI strategy and adoption consultancy AITF. The structure gives WEBIT access to broader technical expertise and operational support while allowing the company to maintain its local identity.
Employee ownership adds another MSP succession option
For founder-led MSPs, succession planning is rarely just about finding a buyer. It is also about deciding what should remain after the founder is gone. That includes the culture, the customer relationships and the people who helped build the business.
Rieger’s answer was employee ownership.
For customers, the transition is designed to be largely invisible. The same teams will manage their accounts, answer support requests and operate under the WEBIT name. Inside the company, however, the relationship between employees and the business has changed: They now have a stake in the company’s long-term success.
After nearly 30 years building WEBIT, Rieger’s final major decision was choosing who should inherit what he built. He chose to entrust the business with the people who were already carrying it forward.
Jonathan Browning is executive director of content and engagement for ChannelPro Network. He has been a leader in the IT channel for close to a decade. He’s an avid fan and early adopter of technology. He believes that the managed services industry is the most important driver of economic growth and human innovation in today’s world.
Featured image: WEBIT Services
