The realities of today’s economy, plus residual fallout from last fall’s world events, are giving a new urgency to customers’ need to integrate their business-critical systems. In some arenas, this need is bordering on compulsion as managers pursue strategies to improve operational efficiency and drive costs out of their businesses. In response, a new generation of connectivity software is arising to address the issue, and a huge new market for enterprise interoperability (EIO) is being created along the way.

Kinetic Information believes the opportunity in this new space will be worth some $62.7 billion by 2006. Vendors in the process management, integration, portals, and workflow arenas already are heeding this call with particular fervor, and as they do, they are erasing the historical boundaries that separated them.

The convergence of these four classes of technology is generating much confusion as buyers and sellers scramble to differentiate one offering from another, and as key players ‘partner-up’ to better capture their fair share of the market. To be sure, the individual technologies are very different. But because they can all be used to solve the same essential problem – to “get stuff to work together,” as users say – they often are deployed in combination, and are paid for out of the same budget pool. Thus, they don’t really spin in separate orbits the way we once thought; instead, they are part of a single market for EIO that revolves around enabling users to work with multiple systems as if they were only one.

Meeting Your Market Challenge
Practically speaking, this convergence means you have competitors you may not even know about, for your prospects may be looking at solutions from companies that “don’t do what we do” to accomplish their objectives. It also means you may be able to creatively partner with those very same companies and convert them from rivals to allies – or perhaps engineer a merger or acquisition so you can directly add complementary functionality to your product line without having to build it all yourself.

To do so, however, you must understand just who’s playing where in terms of markets served and core capabilities offered, and how your respective capabilities overlap and/or dovetail. (See figure below.)

Kinetic Information’s new research program Mapping the Market for Enterprise Interoperability: Friends, Foes & Paths to Profit was created specifically with this task in mind! Based on primary research with vendors, users, and channel participants, it helps you and your business development, product management, and sales organizations chart a successful course through the exciting new EIO marketplace.

As a subscriber to the program, you’ll receive individualized results by receiving personal analyst attention and a private debriefing to discuss the issues in your business  context. This active collaboration – a Kinetic Information hallmark since 1995 – ensures you will receive value not only in support of your research and planning activities, but also your sales and marketing initiatives. And after all, isn’t that where the rubber really meets the road?

Understanding the Market Opportunity
After three-plus years of engaging in independent ERP, CRM, and other enterprise initiatives, even the most cautious customers today realize that the only way to get maximum total value from the investments they’ve made is to unify the individual pieces into a seamless infrastructure. They also know that the keys to this kingdom lie in interconnecting the applications themselves so the business processes they support – and the work they facilitate – can flow freely among them.

The EIO opportunity lies in providing the means to allow this to happen – which is precisely why scores of workflow, business process management, middleware, Web services, portals, and application server providers are already leading the charge. However, achieving and sustaining market dominance requires that you quickly and completely:

• position your offerings so they best fit in among the wide array of choices customers now have

• identify both your most direct competitors so you can work around them and your most suitable potential partners so you can best extend your reach

• anticipate the market’s development path so you can capitalize on the opportunities as they come your way

Deliverables
This exclusive program includes three deliverables as follows:

1. A formal written report that is provided electronically as an Adobe Acrobat file (.pdf). This report contains a written summary of key market dynamics, discussions of more than 20 critical market players, and a market forecast.

 
2. A personal telephone briefing during which key market dynamics are summarized and market opportunities and threats are discussed in your business context.

 
3. Analyst on Call privileges for the 30 days following delivery of the written report. Two named participants at client organizations receive telephone consulting time as needed, with guaranteed response within one business day.

• Interviews with vendors, VARs, and systems integrators
• Analysis of intelligence contained in prior Kinetic Information work
• An exhaustive review of recent IT, business, and trade press coverage

To learn more about this landmark study, or to place an order, please contact Steve Weissman by telephone at 781.893.4690 or via email at [email protected].