For the third consecutive year, IBM ranks number one in terms of worldwide market share for enterprise social software.
This is according to IDC's analysis of 2011 revenue, which notes that IBM grew faster than its competitors and nearly two times faster than the overall market, which grew approximately 40%.
The market research firm says the growing popularity of social networking continues to explode, with more organisations looking for ways to adopt social business practices to integrate global teams, drive innovation, increase productivity, and better reach customers and partners.
According to IDC, the enterprise social platforms market is expected to reach $4.5 billion by 2016, representing growth of 43% over the next four years.
IBM, Jive Software and Communispace make up the top three, with 13.7%, 8.5% and 7.8% share, respectively, as at CY2011. Telligent and SocialText round out the top five with 4.5% and 4.1%, respectively.
Mogen Naidoo, IDC's senior research analyst, software, security and enterprise solutions for sub-Saharan Africa, says many companies are building and implementing overall social business strategies, and enterprise social software is a critical component of those strategies.
“Employees insist on social tools that are similar to consumer social tools they use in their personal lives. Social software provides the experience and functionality of consumer tools, but is built to scale and provide enterprise security,” says Naidoo.
He adds it should be noted that the fastest-growing vendor in the top 20 was Yammer, with a growth rate of 132.3% and a market share of 2.9%, positioning it eighth globally.
Naidoo also notes that, globally, IBM had the largest 2011 market share of 13.7%, representing $971.2 million in revenue.
“IBM has seen a strong growth rate in 2011, at 75%, which is on the back of the IBM Integrated Collaborations Solutions group placing clear focus on the IBM Connections portfolio, as well as the promise of 'Connections Next', or IBM Connections 4.0, expected to go to market in the second half of 2012, initially in the US.
“So essentially, IBM is building on its current solutions that have shown strong growth within the market,” he adds.
However, he explains, companies like Microsoft, which has released its Lync software and SharePoint and is integrating this within its ecosystem (such as Xbox Live, Windows OS, etc), may be at an advantage in the future as its Windows OS leads the software market.
Naidoo also points out that Cisco is another company making large strides within the sector as it integrates its collaboration suite with its existing ecosystem.
Commenting on the South African market, Naidoo says that, even though the country is six to nine months behind first-world countries such as the US and the UK, bring your own device adoption, cloud, mobility and social phenomena are growing immensely within the country.
“With direct presence of large global vendors operating within the country, these technologies are being brought down due to demand for the products. This is backed with the advancements and improvements of infrastructure within the country such as international bandwidth and terrestrial fibre.”
He also points out that enterprises in SA are seeing social collaboration and convergence as a strategic move.
“Enterprises are seeing this as a way for employees to collaborate with each other and be more productive. When looking at the African market, South Africa leads the unified communications market ahead of Nigeria and Kenya, so this illustrates the demand for such technologies. I believe that SA is definitely catching up with first-world countries.”
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