Tuesday, January 08, 2019

Tracking the Technical Velocity of Publishing Software



One of the interesting aspects of the review I am engaged in for my annual publishing technology forecast, relates to the transition publishing industry software providers are undergoing with respect to their technology architecture.   Companies in this segment may be slow to the service oriented architecture (SOA) dance but, be that as it may, we are seeing important and significant redevelopment undertaken by the leading players.  In my report, I’ve tried to represent this as a reflection of ‘velocity’ by suggesting that those companies which are faster to adopt SOA and API driven architectures will accelerate their revenue growth and market share at the expense of other providers.

This chart represents my estimate of where some of these companies are in their development (names removed in this version).  Based on my interviews and interactions with these companies, there is a clear inflection point where companies are beginning to re-architect their platforms.  For any company, this would not be an inconsequential effort but it is especially risky for relatively small, low capitalized software development companies which characterizes this segment.  The investment effort therefore needs to be deliberate and controlled.




To reflect their development paths, I’ve estimated where I see each company’s starting point and how I expect them to move through my (self-defined) velocity funnel over the next few years.  Several segment leaders, which are advanced in their development, will move further and faster through the funnel as they convert older clients to their new solution and bring on new customers from competitors.   Those companies which are slower to invest may see customers defect and may not be able to fund further advancement through the funnel.

There will be more details on these and other market dynamics in my technology report which will be published at the end of January.

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