2023 Information & Automation Management Predictions
Predictions are fun to write and must always be taken with a grain of salt; even so, they always look much more authoritative and impressive when put into the chart form. So we did that.
BPM
Hyland CommunityLive 2022
Hyland took the plunge this year to return to an in-person (Nashville, TN) customer event. That decision was not an easy one to make. Many other tech firms have been struggling with the same decision-making process in the wake of the pandemic. But thankfully, it worked out well, and Community Live was well attended. So …
RPA & Recession
Technology that automates repetitive tasks and cost-cutting go hand in hand, so with a looming recession, it’s logical to expect RPA tools to do well. Overall, they are doing well, but in recent conversations with buyers, systems integrators, and resellers, things are not going as well as they should be.
5 Years of Deep Analysis & Market Shifts
It’s hard to believe that I founded Deep Analysis five years ago (almost to the day). It’s hard to believe we made it this far and that we are looking forward to the next five. But maybe what is hardest to grasp is just how much our industry has changed over these past few years. …
When RPA Met BPM: Post-Acquisition News from Blue Prism
This was a bullish briefing from Blue Prism. SS&C paid $1.65 billion, so we expected nothing less than a moon shot effort. Of course, the proof will be in the pudding, as a lot of product integration promises were made and there is still much work to do here. It’s also hard to imagine that this is the last acquisition SS&C will make. Will the portfolio grow even further with a process intelligence/mining addition on the horizon?
Front to Back at Appian World 2022
But beyond the expected announcements, Appian World was an interesting reflection on the pandemic years and its impact on IT and IT vendors. For Appian, this period has delivered a rocket-sized boost to their business growing around 20% year on year.
Microsoft acquires Minit
Microsoft recently acquired the processing mining vendor Minit. We looked closely at Minit a little while back, and you can read our report on the company and its technology here. In our estimation, this is one of the best small acquisitions Microsoft has made in quite some time.
The Demise of the Content Services Magic Quadrant
Gartner has dropped its Magic Quadrant (MQ) for Content Services; it’s a big event in a relatively small world.
Info Management M&A Roundup March 2022
Every month or two, we do a quick round-up of the deals in the Information Management and Automation sector that caught our eyes. So much activity is a sign of health and strength in the industry.
2022 – A Year of Stasis for ECM & BPM?
Before the pandemic, buyers were assailed by market and sales efforts from RPA and AI document automation vendors alike, which naturally spiked some interest. But the pandemic has driven a more rational reason growth of interest.
M&A Roundup January 2022
OCR and RPA are becoming commodities, but that does not mean the end of capture and process management vendors. Instead, it means it’s time for them to consolidate, hunker down or pivot to new markets.
Where is OpenText?
It is worth noting, that what OpenText is doing is in stark contrast to its nearest competitor Hyland (backed by PE firm Thoma Bravo). That has over the past couple of years acquired a blockchain startup (Learning Machine), an RPA vendor (Another Monday) along with open source DAM/ECM vendors (Nuxeo & Alfresco).
Mobius & UIPath take off – Our Thoughts
All in all quite month of activity, but all of course, overshadowed by the UIPath IPO. It will be interesting to see how this impacts the enterprise automation market in the short and long term. Undoubtedly some of the money raised, possibly much of the money, will go toward multiple acquisitions.
How to Turn an Aircraft Carrier: A Review of OpenText World 2021
We attended OpenText World Europe this April to learn where the ship is headed. OpenText made it very clear that it is staking its content management future on the cloud. The company announced Cloud Editions 21.2, an all-encompassing, all-in effort to achieve that long turn away from on-premise legacy software. Mark Barranchea, CEO, pledged an R&D investment of over $1 billion in R&D in their diverse stable of products. For a company with $3 billion in sales last year, that is a very impressive number.
IBM acquires MyInvenio – Our Thoughts
The MyInvenio deal follows closely on the heels of IBM’s acquisition of Brazilian RPA vendor WDG and add’s yet more practical functionality to its growing Cloud Pak services. Despite IBM being one of the largest IT vendors, its work in moving advanced automation to the cloud has received less attention than one might expect.
SAP Buys Signavio – Our Thoughts
Today SAP announced that it is to acquire process intelligence vendor Signavio for $1.2B. Considering Signavio’s revenues were around $100m, and it had raised almost $230m in funding, that’s a high price to pay. But is such a high price justified, and why would SAP contemplate paying so much in the first place?
Enterprise AI & a New Dotcom?
But, here’s the thing, a couple of years ago, everyone was talking about AI, but few were doing it. This past year things changed fast; now, there is a mad rush to embrace AI or get left behind. But its easier said than done, AI tools, models, and libraries are readily available, but skills, knowledge of specific user needs, and good data are not.
Is Cognitive Capture the next RPA?
Few saw the potential impact that RPA would have on the market, though many practice a form of revisionism to claim that they did. The fact is that most ‘experts’ saw RPA as a flash in the pan that would have little impact on a mature, stable, and lucrative BPM market. The experts were wrong; …
The Danger of Over Simplifying Complex Enterprise Software
Even though analysts need to label and sort enterprise technologies into neat silos, this practice has always been of limited value. As it often makes navigating a buyer toward the right product for their needs much harder than it should be.
Hyland acquires Alfresco – A quick take
The price has not been disclosed, but off the record, estimates tell me that TH Lee has made a tidy profit on their investment and that Hyland has not overpaid. However, as always, it is essential to note that no M&A transaction is without tears. Alfresco ran a long and steady race as an independent championing open source ECM