The top focus for IT services spending in the coming 12 months will be spread across five key areas, including IT infrastructure resources consolidation, security enhancement, IT-enabled business innovation, social applications and Big data & Analytics.
“As we look ahead to 2015, the industry is entering the most critical period of disruptive transformation - what IDC calls the “innovation stage” of the 3rd Platform era,” says Cathy Huang, Research Manager, Services and Cloud Research Group, IDC Asia/Pacific.
“IT services (inclusive of Cloud services) will be the most important catalyst and enabler, to facilitate this trend.”
As a result, Huang speculates that the opportunities will not only be found in the professional services market, which IDC expects to double in the next three years, but also in the managed services and outsourcing markets.
The 2014 IDC IT Services Survey also asked respondents the primary services types they engage for each critical investment focus area.
Among the top three areas, the results showed a high level of acceptance towards consulting type of services leading the analyst firm to predict the “broad adoption of 3rd platform technology” will double the current enterprise investment on professional services in the next three years.
On the managed/outsourcing services model, more than 39% of respondents chose this option as the primary service types they will engage in 2015.
The business innovation theme is highest at 54%, which means more than half of the respondents chose the outsourcing/managed services model when it comes to meeting business innovation needs.
“This finding is in line with the current transformation happening in the offshore and Business Process Outsourcing (BPO) market,” Huang adds.
“Customers who are currently outsourcing their business processes are moving away from pure cost reduction metrics to more business insights-driven metrics which can help them innovate.”
Consequently, IDC believes customers will select partners who can help provide business data/insight and consulting services to help them enhance their competitive positioning.
“Moreover, the BPO service delivery is moving toward a platform-based model, and customers expect a high level of automation,” Huang adds.
“The promise of Business Process-as-a-Service (BPaaS) is to provide the next quantum of reducing costs, speed of service delivery, better financial management, and the ability to integrate more easily with other business processes. "
