Last reviewed July 2026 · Reviewed by Ben Fox, Managing Director
What managed IT services include
A complete managed service covers the whole technology stack under one agreement, so nothing falls between the cracks. Here is the scope a PTS managed service covers, and what each part means day to day.
Service desk & user support
A responsive, multilingual helpdesk plus on-site engineers for the issues remote fixes can’t reach — the everyday support covered in full on our IT support page.
- Service desk in English, Cantonese and Mandarin
- On-site engineers across Hong Kong Island, Kowloon and the New Territories
- Every request logged, tracked and reported — nothing lost in someone’s inbox
Cybersecurity & compliance
Layered cybersecurity aligned to ISO 27001 and Hong Kong PDPO, built into the service rather than bolted on. See cybersecurity services.
- Endpoint protection, patching and email security as standard
- Identity and access management — MFA, Conditional Access, joiner and leaver controls
- Phishing awareness training and incident response support
Cloud & Microsoft 365
Day-to-day administration, migrations and backup for Microsoft 365 and Azure. See cloud services.
- User provisioning, licensing, Exchange, SharePoint, OneDrive and Teams administration
- New-tenant setup and security hardening
- Backup and recovery for cloud workloads
Networks & infrastructure
Reliable networks, Wi-Fi and servers — designed, monitored and maintained so users never have to think about them.
- Firewalls, switching and business Wi-Fi across the major vendor stacks
- Proactive monitoring and maintenance of servers and infrastructure
- Larger IT projects scoped separately when you grow or move
Procurement & lifecycle
Vendor-neutral hardware and licence procurement, so kit is bought well and replaced before it fails. See IT procurement.
- Sourcing, supply and warranty management across Hong Kong, China and Singapore
- Licence tracking and renewal management
- Asset registers and refresh planning
IT strategy & vCIO
Regular reviews and a Virtual CIO who plans budgets and roadmaps with you — the strategic layer most break-fix providers never offer. See IT advisory / vCIO.
- Scheduled service reviews with clear written reporting
- Budgets, refresh cycles and roadmaps planned ahead, not improvised
- A named contact who knows your business and where it’s going
Managed IT services for businesses in Hong Kong, China and Singapore
Managed IT services means handing the running of your technology to one accountable managed service provider (MSP) — service desk, cybersecurity, cloud, networks, procurement and IT strategy — for a predictable monthly fee, instead of firefighting in-house or juggling a handful of disconnected vendors. PTS has been that IT service provider for businesses across Hong Kong, Mainland China and Singapore since 2001.
We become your IT department, or work alongside the one you already have: an IT service company with a multilingual service desk your staff can actually reach, engineers on the ground in three markets, security aligned to our ISO/IEC 27001 certification, and a named contact who understands your business — not a ticket number.
Day-to-day IT support is one part of a managed service; for the helpdesk in depth see IT support. For the rest of the stack, explore cybersecurity, cloud & Microsoft 365 and IT projects. Still deciding whether to outsource at all? Read our guide to in-house IT vs managed services.
Fully-managed vs co-managed IT
There is no single right model — it depends on whether you have any IT capability in-house.
- Fully managed — PTS is your IT department. Best for businesses with no internal IT, or where the owner or office manager has been absorbing it. You get a whole team’s coverage without a single hire.
- Co-managed — PTS works alongside your in-house person or team, taking on monitoring, security, after-hours cover, projects or specialist skills they don’t have. Best when you have someone capable but stretched, or a single point of failure you want to de-risk.
We scope which model fits at the start, and the line can move as you grow.
Service levels and proactive management
An outsourced IT operation is only as good as its response when something breaks. Every PTS managed agreement includes written service levels aligned to business impact — the same benchmarks we publish for IT support:
| Priority | Typical scenario | Response benchmark |
|---|---|---|
| P1 — critical (business stopping) | Office-wide outage, server or network down, suspected security incident | Acknowledged within 30 minutes; engineer engaged immediately |
| P2 — high (significant impact) | A team or a key application can’t work | Within 1–2 hours |
| P3 — standard | Single-user issues and routine requests | Same business day |
Benchmarks apply during business hours; out-of-hours and 24/7 cover are available on extended-hours and fully managed tiers. We’ll tell you honestly whether you need them — most Hong Kong businesses don’t.
Response times only describe what happens after something fails, though. The larger point of a managed service is that fewer things fail in the first place.
What proactive management means in practice
- Monitoring — agents on your servers, network and endpoints raise alerts before users notice a problem
- Patching — security updates applied on a schedule, not when someone remembers
- Maintenance windows — upgrades and remediation planned around your working hours, not during them
- Problem management — we fix the immediate issue, then address the root cause so it stops recurring
- Monthly reporting — ticket volumes, response performance, recurring issues and recommended improvements, in writing
How onboarding works
Moving to a managed service — or between providers — is a structured project, not a leap of faith. A typical onboarding runs four to six weeks for an SME, and six to ten for a multi-site or regulated environment. The plan is agreed in writing before anything changes.
1. Discovery & documentation
We audit and document your environment — users, devices, licences, networks, vendors, accounts and risks — and capture knowledge from any outgoing provider or internal arrangement, so support is informed from day one rather than guesswork.
2. Tooling & monitoring rollout
We deploy our management tooling — monitoring, the remote management agent, ticketing access for your staff — and begin structured patching, so the proactive layer is already working before the formal switchover.
3. Handover & steady state
We transition support, go live, and run a hypercare period with extra attention while your team settles in — then move into the steady rhythm of monitoring, support and scheduled reviews.
Leaving an incumbent provider? Our 30-day playbook for switching IT support providers in Hong Kong covers the handover pack to insist on and the pitfalls to avoid.
Managed IT services vs in-house
A single in-house hire is a fixed cost that concentrates all your knowledge in one person who takes leave, gets sick, and eventually resigns; a managed service converts that into a scalable operating cost with a whole team, broader skills and built-in cover. In-house still wins for very large or highly specialised teams — we walk through the full trade-offs, the cost comparison and the hybrid model in in-house IT vs managed services in Hong Kong.
IT outsourcing in Hong Kong
IT outsourcing means contracting the running of your technology to an external provider instead of employing the capability yourself — and a managed service is its structured form: contractual, proactive and measured against written SLAs, rather than hourly billing after something has broken. Outsourcing doesn’t have to be all or nothing. The fully-managed and co-managed models above cover both ends: fully managed when PTS is your entire IT department, and co-managed when you outsource specific functions — monitoring, security, after-hours cover, projects — alongside an in-house team that’s capable but stretched.
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Platforms we manage
A managed service is only as strong as the provider’s depth on your actual stack. We deploy and run the mainstream enterprise platforms daily across our managed clients — Microsoft 365, Azure and Intune; Cisco Meraki, Fortinet and Aruba networking; Apple, Dell, HP and Lenovo fleets; VMware, Veeam and Acronis for backup; and Microsoft Defender, Proofpoint and Mimecast for security. The full vendor list — networking, end-user devices, cloud, security and AV — is on our IT support page.
If your stack isn’t listed, ask — we likely support it. Vendor-neutral means we recommend what’s right for your business, not what carries a margin.
Who managed IT services are for
Most of our managed clients fall into two profiles: Hong Kong businesses from around 10 users upwards that have outgrown ad-hoc IT, and overseas companies that need an accountable IT operation on the ground in Hong Kong, China or Singapore without building one themselves.
Both are proven in practice. In Extending Global IT Support into Asia, a UK-headquartered multinational with no IT team in the region made PTS an extension of its global IT function — replacing ticket queues routed through the UK overnight with immediate multilingual support and streamlined procurement across Hong Kong, Singapore and Mainland China. In Transforming IT for a Local Hong Kong Business, a 20-person professional services firm with no in-house IT moved to a structured managed service — regular patching, a redesigned Wi-Fi network, monitoring and helpdesk — and saw downtime fall and reliability return.
Financial services
Brokers, asset managers and fund platforms that need due-diligence-ready IT and security. See IT for financial services in Hong Kong.
Family offices
Single and multi-family offices that need institutional-grade security and discretion from a small footprint. See family office IT.
Private equity
Lean deal teams that need dependable day-to-day IT plus support through acquisitions and integrations. See IT for private equity firms.
Law firms
Practices whose systems carry privileged and confidential matter material, and whose clients increasingly audit their security. See IT for law firms in Hong Kong.
Education
International schools and education providers managing large device fleets, campus-wide Wi-Fi and classroom technology. See education sector IT.
Still weighing a hire against outsourcing? Compare in-house vs managed IT costs — including the realistic loaded cost of a Hong Kong IT hire — in our in-house IT vs managed services guide.
PTS as a managed service provider (MSP) in Hong Kong
PTS is a Hong Kong-based managed service provider, and has operated as one since 2001 — running the full IT operation, from service desk through security, cloud, networks and procurement to strategy, under one accountable agreement. British-owned and in Hong Kong since 2001 with a local team of more than 20 people, we deliver the same service through our own office in Singapore — also more than 20 strong — and our locally registered entity in Shanghai, with a service desk that works in English, Cantonese and Mandarin.
Two things separate an MSP from the broader pool of IT companies. The first is the operating model: contractual, proactive and measured against written SLAs — not hourly billing after something has already broken. The second is evidence that the provider runs its own house properly. PTS is independently certified to ISO/IEC 27001 (information security) and ISO/IEC 20000 (IT service management) — externally audited standards, not vendor partner badges.
If you’re comparing MSPs, judge any provider — including us — against the criteria below.
How to choose a managed IT service provider in Hong Kong
Most providers’ websites read the same; the real differences only show when something breaks. Evaluate any managed IT service provider — including us — against these criteria:
- Local engineering depth — engineers genuinely based in Hong Kong who can be on site within hours, not an offshore team routing tickets
- Multilingual service desk — support in English, Cantonese and Mandarin, so staff raise issues in the language they prefer
- Independent certifications — externally audited standards such as ISO/IEC 27001 and 20000, not just vendor partner badges
- Cross-border capability — legally registered presence and local engineers in Mainland China and Singapore, if you operate there
- Vendor neutrality — recommendations shaped by your needs, not resale margins or partner relationships
- Written SLAs — response benchmarks in the contract, measured and reported monthly
The first five are the five-factor evaluation we publish and score ourselves against; the full guide covers the questions to ask each provider before signing.
How managed IT services are priced
Managed IT services in Hong Kong are priced in three common ways.
Per user, per month. The most common model. The fee scales with headcount, which keeps cost predictable and roughly proportional to the support load. This is how we scope PTS engagements — headcount is the single biggest variable.
Per device. Charged per managed endpoint or server rather than per person. It suits environments where the device estate is larger than the headcount suggests, but the number can drift as kit accumulates.
Fixed monthly retainer. A flat fee for an agreed scope. Simple and predictable for stable environments, provided the scope is written down precisely.
Whatever the model, it helps to anchor the number against the alternative. A junior-to-mid in-house IT manager in Hong Kong loaded costs roughly HK$45,000–90,000 a month once salary, MPF, recruitment and training are counted — a senior hire runs north of HK$600,000 a year — and one person covers only a fraction of the disciplines a business needs. A typical 50-user office with business-hours managed support sits in the same total-cost range as that single hire; the difference is what you get for the money: a team of specialists rather than one generalist, structured escalation, and no recruitment exposure. The full comparison is in our in-house IT vs managed services guide.
We don’t publish per-user rates, because no two engagements are the same and a public number either disappoints or misleads. Instead: a free initial conversation, a light-touch discovery of your environment, and a costed written proposal — typically within 48 hours of the initial conversation.
What drives the monthly fee
The variables that move the number, in rough order of weight:
- Headcount — the single biggest variable
- Number of sites — multi-site adds operational complexity
- Operating hours — business hours, extended hours, or 24/7
- Coverage tier — remote-only, remote plus scheduled on-site, or fully managed
- Tech-stack complexity — standard Microsoft 365 and Meraki is simpler than legacy servers and custom applications
- Compliance requirements — PDPO, SFC, HKMA or ISO-aligned commitments are priced explicitly
What’s typically excluded
Scoped and quoted separately, so the monthly fee stays clean:
- Project work — office moves, migrations and infrastructure builds run on their own statement of work; see IT projects
- Hardware and software licences, supplied on agreed terms through IT procurement
- Bespoke software development and application customisation
What our agreements don’t have
The fine print — or rather, the absence of it:
- No hidden setup or onboarding fees beyond what’s in the proposal
- No surprise per-incident charges within the scoped service
- No long lock-in — a 12-month term with three-month termination notice is standard
- No “minimum hours” you have to use or lose
Request a proposal — answer a few quick questions below and we’ll come back with a practical, costed proposal, usually within two business days.
Why businesses choose PTS
British-owned and Hong Kong-based since 2001, PTS is independently certified to ISO/IEC 27001 and ISO/IEC 20000, vendor-neutral, and staffed by engineers on the ground in Hong Kong, Mainland China and Singapore. That combination — local delivery, cross-border reach and genuine certifications — is rare among Hong Kong providers. See what that looks like in practice in our case studies.
Managed IT services FAQs
What is the difference between managed IT services and IT support?
IT support is the day-to-day helpdesk and fixing of issues. Managed IT services is the broader arrangement where one provider runs your whole technology operation — support plus security, cloud, networks, procurement and strategy — proactively and for a predictable fee. IT support is one part of a managed service.
What is included in a managed IT service?
Typically: a multilingual service desk and on-site support, proactive monitoring and patching, cybersecurity, Microsoft 365 and cloud administration, network and Wi-Fi management, hardware and licence procurement, and regular reviews with a Virtual CIO. We tailor the scope to your business.
How much do managed IT services cost in Hong Kong?
The fee depends on six drivers: headcount (the biggest variable), number of sites, operating hours, coverage tier, tech-stack complexity and compliance requirements. Most Hong Kong providers price per user per month; we scope each engagement individually and return a costed written proposal within 48 hours of the initial conversation rather than publishing one-size-fits-all packages. See how managed IT services are priced above.
What should I look for in a managed IT services provider in Hong Kong?
Look for engineers genuinely based in Hong Kong (not offshore ticket-routing), multilingual coverage (English, Cantonese and Mandarin), independent certifications such as ISO/IEC 27001 and 20000 (not just vendor partner badges), real cross-border capability if you have China or Singapore operations, and a vendor-neutral approach so advice isn’t shaped by resale margins. We set out the full checklist in our five-factor evaluation.
Do you offer fully-managed and co-managed options?
Yes. We can act as your entire IT department (fully managed) or work alongside your in-house person or team (co-managed), taking on monitoring, security, projects and after-hours cover. We agree which model fits at the outset.
What response times do you commit to?
Every managed agreement includes written service levels: P1 critical (business stopping) acknowledged within 30 minutes during business hours with an engineer engaged immediately; P2 high within 1–2 hours; P3 standard same business day. Out-of-hours and 24/7 cover are available on extended-hours and fully managed tiers.
How long does onboarding take?
A typical onboarding runs four to six weeks for an SME and six to ten weeks for a multi-site or regulated environment: discovery and documentation first, then tooling and monitoring rollout, then handover and go-live with a hypercare period. The plan is agreed in writing before any switchover starts.
Can you take over from our current IT provider?
Yes. We run a structured onboarding that audits and documents your environment, then transitions support with minimal disruption. We do this regularly and manage the handover end to end — see our playbook for switching providers.
Do you provide managed IT services in China and Singapore?
Yes. We support businesses across Hong Kong, Mainland China and Singapore, with a locally-registered Chinese entity and engineers in each market. See our China IT services and IT support in Singapore.
Are you a managed service provider (MSP) in Hong Kong?
Yes. PTS is a Hong Kong-based MSP, operating since 2001 and certified to ISO/IEC 27001 and ISO/IEC 20000. We run the full IT operation — service desk, security, cloud, networks and strategy — for businesses across Hong Kong, Mainland China and Singapore under one accountable agreement.
What is the difference between a managed service provider and break-fix IT?
A managed service provider works proactively under a contract and agreed SLAs — monitoring, patching and securing your systems to prevent problems, for a predictable monthly fee. Break-fix IT is reactive and billed by the hour after something has already gone wrong. Managed services catch issues earlier and make costs predictable.
Do you provide managed IT support for small and mid-sized businesses?
Yes. Most of our managed clients are SMEs and satellite offices from around 10 users upwards — businesses that have outgrown ad-hoc support but don’t need (or can’t justify) a full internal IT team. You get a whole team’s range of skills, holiday and sickness cover, and a predictable monthly cost.