New research from Datamonitor has predicted that the European business-to-business software market, enabled by the business process management (BPM) and business process integration (BPI) market, is expected to grow to almost US$2bn by 2005.
The research, commissioned by e-business integration software firm Sterling Commerce, found that the lion’s share of the US$1.9bn European market for BPM and BPI technologies will be captured in the UK, Germany and France. Most of the spend will come from the European financial services market (US$482m), manufacturing (US$375m), the retail, wholesale and distribution sector (US$268m) and communications (US$200m).
The white paper research found that the key factor driving the growth of the BPM/BPI market was enterprises’ need to ‘regain control’ of their business and technology, through a unified business process integration.
The research also says that the strong demand for BPI technologies across Europe is largely due to the greater need for BPI and collaboration of people, systems and processes across various geographical boundaries. Relatively advanced enterprise resource planning (ERP), customer relationship management (CRM) and sell-side initiatives will also drive growth, along with a surge in the demand for BPM and business activity monitoring solutions.
Lack of visibility across an organisation’s supply chain proved to be both a challenge and a driving force for BPM/BPI activities. Lack of visibility in this regard can lead to excess costs and inaccuracies due to manual processes and stock levels, poor customer service and an inability to respond to market changes.
Sterling Commerce is one of the world’s largest providers of business integration solutions and its software is used to help organisations improve current or deploy new business processes by integrating applications and establishing clearer links with partners and suppliers. The company is active in Ireland and has implemented BPI projects with organisations such as Glanbia and BNP Paribas at the International Financial Services Centre.
By John Kennedy
