Some of Harvey's perspectives on the capture software market follow. Make sure to check out his web site for more information -- http://www.hsassocs.com. Harvey knows more about the capture software market than just about anyone I know.
Paper consumption used to grow consistent with GDP; there was an inflection point in this relationship about 2002. Now growth is becoming linked to the elimination of paper and the digitization of processes. Capture at its core is the means by which information comes into the enterprise. It is currently a highly fragmented market, with many vendors. Contrary to conventional opinion, capture is not a mature market.
The overall end user capture software market in 2007 was about $1.7 billion. The market grew at a 16.8% rate between 2006 and 2007. Harvey estimates a CAGR of 15.1% through 2011. The top 5 vendors account for about 40% of the market. Harvey sees these primary industry segments: 1) ad-hoc desktop, including OC; 2) batch and distributed batch processing; and 3) transaction processing and process management. Significant growth in 2007 in the transaction processing and process management market (esp. Invoice processing, AP, and explanation of benefits applications).
Harvey thinks the traditional document channel is going to have challenges. The typical VAR is a small company selling small systems in a geographical concise area. There are going to be scaling challenges for many companies as the size of deal rises. In the MFP channel, manufacturers are buying distributors; direct sales are increasingly important for the future (Xerox buys Global, Oce buys Imagistics, Konica buys Danka US and Australia, Ricoh bought Danka Europe and IKON, Toshiba and Sharp buying local distributors). An implication of all of this for users is that the supplier will lead with its OWN capture software solutions.
A comment...
Harvey ultimately see the Microsoft channel, driven by SharePoint, as playing an increasingly important role and potentially replacing many traditional document channel players. As I think about all of this and its relevance to AIIM, a thought occurs to me. As these entrants come into the document channel, the likelihood that they actually KNOW something about the things that our community cares about (imaging, capture, records, process) decreases. Is there a role for AIIM to play in qualifying the channel in some way at a company level, not an individual certification level so that users can have some confidence that the partner they are dealing with actually KNOWS something about imaging, capture, records, and process and not just the placement of Office files in a SharePoint repository?
Seems to me worth thinking about...
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