Black Rabbit Builds an MSSP Stack Without the Vendor Tax

Black Rabbit Cyber

Black Rabbit Cyber

Other

Albert Guerra

Albert Guerra

Owner

1-50

Employees

300

Managed Seats

Black Rabbit Builds an MSSP Stack Without the Vendor Tax

Summary

Albert launched Black Rabbit Cyber in mid-December and immediately needed a platform that could handle remote access, monitoring, and security across 300+ endpoints - without locking him into a multi-year contract or demanding minimum endpoint commitments. OpenFrame delivered. Remote control and PowerShell integration let him manage client devices from anywhere (critical when he's not always at his home base), while Mingo gives him a bird's eye view of his environment. He ran a vulnerability assessment through the AI and got back actionable security intel - SMB1 status, legacy TLS configurations, the works - without having to audit each machine manually.

Challenge

Here's the reality of starting a new MSSP: every vendor wants a piece of every client. Kaseya requires a 25-endpoint minimum with a three-year commitment. Barracuda's per-endpoint pricing means your costs climb with every new client you sign. Albert had looked at them all - and the math just didn't work for a brand new operation with limited cash flow. He even tried rolling his own security platform by integrating Wazuh with AI on Linode, but it was hit or miss. The concept was right, the execution was too complex to depend on.
The traditional vendor model creates a chicken-and-egg problem: you need clients to afford the tools, but you need the tools to service the clients. For a three-person MSSP managing everything from law firms to industrial manufacturers, an affordable and complete platform isn't a nice-to-have - it's the difference between getting off the ground or not.

Solution

OpenFrame gave Albert what the commercial vendors couldn't - a clean deployment with zero financial barriers. The PowerShell agent installed without a single issue. He was expecting problems based on his Wazuh experience, but the process was smooth across the board. The web-based dashboard means he can manage his clients from any device - laptop, iPad, tablet - which matters when you're not always in front of your main workstation.
But the real standout is Mingo. Albert had been trying to build exactly this - an AI layer on top of his security tooling that could assess vulnerabilities and provide actionable intelligence. When he tested Mingo by asking for a vulnerability rundown on his Windows machines, it came back with detailed findings: confirmed SMB1 was disabled, flagged legacy TLS status, and surfaced security posture information that would normally take manual auditing to uncover. That's the kind of visibility a brand new MSSP needs to demonstrate value to clients from day one.

Results

• Deployment: Agent installed across client devices with zero issues - up and running immediately

• Vendor cost avoidance: Eliminated multi-year contracts and minimum endpoint commitments that would have cost thousands upfront

• Security visibility: AI-powered vulnerability assessments replacing manual security audits across 300 endpoints

• Accessibility: Full remote management from any device - managing clients remotely even while away from home base

• Stack consolidation: On track to replace multiple standalone tools (RMM, security monitoring, remote access) with a single platform

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Frequently Asked Questions

Start with a readiness assessment, not a tool purchase. Confirm your ticket history is clean and your RMM, PSA, and monitoring systems connect. Then pick one high-volume, low-risk workflow, usually ticket triage, and pilot it on internal tickets before any client sees it.
It can be, with governance. Keep a human in the loop on high-risk actions, log every automated step for audit, and choose platforms that keep your data yours with no vendor lock-in. Pilot on internal data first so you catch issues before client systems are involved.
Set a baseline before rollout, then track tickets closed per technician, mean time to resolution, percentage of tickets resolved with no human touch, technician hours reclaimed, and cost per ticket. AI-driven automation commonly cuts operational cost per ticket by 25 to 40%.
AI decouples revenue from headcount. When automation handles routine work, labor costs grow slower than revenue, so margins expand as you scale. The 2026 Kaseya report found 53% of MSPs already automate ticketing, patching, and monitoring to protect margin.
Common platforms include Thread for triage, Rewst and Power Automate for workflow automation, NeoAgent for L1 resolution, and ConnectWise zofiQ inside its PSA. OpenFrame runs agents natively inside an all-in-one platform rather than bolting them onto separate tools.
Deployment data on five-person service desks shows $78,000 to $130,000 in annual direct labor savings, roughly 30% fewer escalations, and 15% to 20% better SLA compliance. Savings come from reclaimed capacity, not headcount cuts.
Automate internal delivery first, since ticket triage, patching, and monitoring deliver the fastest labor savings. Then pick one billable AI outcome priced as a result, not a markup. Reinvest the freed technician hours into higher-margin advisory work with clients.
MSPs use AI to triage and route tickets, cut alert noise, schedule patches, assist L1 security work, and draft client reports. Kaseya's 2025 benchmark found 30% already use it to eliminate tedious tasks, with ticket triage the most common starting point.
Most MSPs start with AI features inside their existing PSA, RMM, and ticketing systems rather than standalone products. Common categories include AI ticket triage, alert correlation, scripting assistants, and AI-native all-in-one platforms like OpenFrame that run intelligence across the whole stack.
Automate high-volume, low-risk tasks first. Ticket triage and alert noise reduction top the list because they run constantly and a human still resolves the underlying issue. Save security approvals, billing changes, and client-facing actions for later, always with a human in the loop.

Try it. Break it.

Deploy it. Love it.

And finally, stop paying $14K/month for tools that fight each other.