Worldwide business intelligence (BI), corporate performance management (CPM) and analytics applications/performance management software revenue totalled $13.1 billion in 2012, a 6.8 per cent increase from 2011 revenue of $12.3 billion, according to Gartner, Inc. Tough macro conditions and confusion related to emerging technology terms led to more muted market growth than in previous years.
"After a few historic banner years of spend in the BI software market, which culminated in more than 17 per cent growth in 2011, growth was more subdued in 2012, at seven per cent," said Dan Sommer, principal research analyst at Gartner. "While this seems like a dramatic drop, it was in line with our forecasts published during 2012."
Gartner identified five key market dynamics that affected BI software spend and growth in 2012. The first two of these - challenging macro economics and term confusion around "analytics," "big data" and "BI" - had a negative impact on market growth while the third - BI spending moving outside of IT, causing the semantic layer to go into maintenance mode - had a neutral effect. However, the fourth and fifth dynamics - data discovery becoming a mainstream architecture and software as a service (SaaS), while still emerging, being the preferred option for granular analytics - were drivers of market growth.
While all five of the top five BI software vendors retained their top five status, IBM and SAS exchanged places to move IBM into third position and SAS into fourth (see Table 1). IBM grew 9.9 per cent in 2012, with revenue of $1.6 billion. The top five vendors together accounted for 70 per cent of the total BI software market revenue.
In first place, SAP once again had significantly higher revenue than any other vendor at $2.9 billion with 22.1 per cent of the market, although this was up by just 0.6 per cent from 2011. Second-place Oracle's revenue grew by 2.0 per cent from 2011 to reach $1.9 billion. Fifth-place Microsoft enjoyed the highest growth of the top five vendors in 2012, with revenue rising by 12.2 per cent compared with 2011, to reach $1.2 billion.
"The business intelligence space managed to grow by a reasonable seven per cent in 2012, despite difficult macro conditions, being on the tail end of a spending cycle, and confusion related to emerging technology terms causing a hold on purse strings," said Mr Sommer. "On the positive side, data discovery became a mainstream architecture in 2012 and the vendors built on this paradigm gained market share, while most semantically layered BI platforms grew in the single digits, at best. Cloud-based buying is also starting to make an imprint on the radar, showing substantial growth, although cloud still accounts for a smaller portion of the BI market compared with other application markets."
On a regional level, Europe and Latin America showed subpar growth because of tough macro conditions and currency headwinds, which impacted vendors with a heavy weighting toward those geographies. Eurasia, the Middle East and Africa, and Asia/Pacific, however, continued to display double-digit growth patterns.
More detailed analysis is available in the report "Market Share Analysis: Business Intelligence, Analytics and Performance Management, 2012." The report is available on Gartner's web site at http://www.gartner.com/....
Additional information and analysis on the BI software market will be discussed at the Gartner Business Intelligence & Information Management Summit 2013 taking place June 10-11 in Mumbai, India. The Gartner BI & Information Management Summit is specifically designed to drive organisations toward analytics excellence by exploring the latest trends in BI and analytics and examining how the two disciplines relate to one another. Gartner analysts will discuss how the Nexus of Forces will impact BI and analytics, and share best practices for developing and managing successful mobile BI, analytics and master data management initiatives.
More information on the BI & Information Management Summit can be found at http://www.gartner.com/.... Members of the press can register for this summit by contacting Sony Shetty at sony.shetty@gartner.com.
Information from the Gartner BI & Information Management Summit 2013 will be shared on Twitter at http://twitter.com/Gartner_inc using #GartnerBI.
"After a few historic banner years of spend in the BI software market, which culminated in more than 17 per cent growth in 2011, growth was more subdued in 2012, at seven per cent," said Dan Sommer, principal research analyst at Gartner. "While this seems like a dramatic drop, it was in line with our forecasts published during 2012."
Gartner identified five key market dynamics that affected BI software spend and growth in 2012. The first two of these - challenging macro economics and term confusion around "analytics," "big data" and "BI" - had a negative impact on market growth while the third - BI spending moving outside of IT, causing the semantic layer to go into maintenance mode - had a neutral effect. However, the fourth and fifth dynamics - data discovery becoming a mainstream architecture and software as a service (SaaS), while still emerging, being the preferred option for granular analytics - were drivers of market growth.
While all five of the top five BI software vendors retained their top five status, IBM and SAS exchanged places to move IBM into third position and SAS into fourth (see Table 1). IBM grew 9.9 per cent in 2012, with revenue of $1.6 billion. The top five vendors together accounted for 70 per cent of the total BI software market revenue.
In first place, SAP once again had significantly higher revenue than any other vendor at $2.9 billion with 22.1 per cent of the market, although this was up by just 0.6 per cent from 2011. Second-place Oracle's revenue grew by 2.0 per cent from 2011 to reach $1.9 billion. Fifth-place Microsoft enjoyed the highest growth of the top five vendors in 2012, with revenue rising by 12.2 per cent compared with 2011, to reach $1.2 billion.
"The business intelligence space managed to grow by a reasonable seven per cent in 2012, despite difficult macro conditions, being on the tail end of a spending cycle, and confusion related to emerging technology terms causing a hold on purse strings," said Mr Sommer. "On the positive side, data discovery became a mainstream architecture in 2012 and the vendors built on this paradigm gained market share, while most semantically layered BI platforms grew in the single digits, at best. Cloud-based buying is also starting to make an imprint on the radar, showing substantial growth, although cloud still accounts for a smaller portion of the BI market compared with other application markets."
On a regional level, Europe and Latin America showed subpar growth because of tough macro conditions and currency headwinds, which impacted vendors with a heavy weighting toward those geographies. Eurasia, the Middle East and Africa, and Asia/Pacific, however, continued to display double-digit growth patterns.
More detailed analysis is available in the report "Market Share Analysis: Business Intelligence, Analytics and Performance Management, 2012." The report is available on Gartner's web site at http://www.gartner.com/....
Additional information and analysis on the BI software market will be discussed at the Gartner Business Intelligence & Information Management Summit 2013 taking place June 10-11 in Mumbai, India. The Gartner BI & Information Management Summit is specifically designed to drive organisations toward analytics excellence by exploring the latest trends in BI and analytics and examining how the two disciplines relate to one another. Gartner analysts will discuss how the Nexus of Forces will impact BI and analytics, and share best practices for developing and managing successful mobile BI, analytics and master data management initiatives.
More information on the BI & Information Management Summit can be found at http://www.gartner.com/.... Members of the press can register for this summit by contacting Sony Shetty at sony.shetty@gartner.com.
Information from the Gartner BI & Information Management Summit 2013 will be shared on Twitter at http://twitter.com/Gartner_inc using #GartnerBI.
