Business software market to grow 8.2% in 2011

By eGovInnovation Editors | Jun 25, 2011

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The global business software market will grow 8.2 percent this year and hit $267 billion in revenues as recovery from the global economic downturn starts, according to Ovum.

The new forecast added that the sector will grow at a compound annual growth rate (CAGR) of 7.7 percent in the next four years, reaching revenues of $358 billion by  2015. Ovum said this will be driven by exploding volumes of data, increased enterprise mobility, transition to cloud computing and emerging markets.

The information management software sector will experience the biggest increase in revenues of all the business software areas. This area will grow at a CAGR of almost 10 percent from 2010 to 2015.

“As the global economy continues its recovery, the emphasis on IT investment is moving from the traditional area of back-office automation and transaction processing towards the exploitation of information to add value to the business," Tim Jennings, Ovum chief analyst, said. “The volume of information within enterprises continues to grow at an astonishing rate, and investment is needed to both manage this information and turn it into actionable intelligence, through technologies such as business intelligence and analytics.”

Ovum has also released a new vendor rankings analysis, which paints a picture of the companies dominating the software space. Microsoft continues to be the world’s number-one software company, with more than 20 percent market share. It is followed by Oracle, IBM and SAP, in second, third and fourth place, respectively.

“Microsoft is still a major player and market maker, with revenues of $62 billion in 2010. The company has gained huge mass and velocity over the past 20+ years, and this looks set to sustain the company in the short and medium-term," Ovum principal analyst Richard Edwards said. “However, its level of innovation is not keeping pace with the rest of the market – it is doing just enough to stay in the game, but is not a star performer.”