Australian organisations are forecast to spend almost A$70 million on business process management suites (BPMS) in 2013, an increase of 10.4 percent over 2012, according to Gartner. Worldwide spending on BPMS is expected to reach US$2.8 billion, up 9.5 percent compared to 2012.

Speaking ahead of the keynote presentation at the Gartner Business Process Management Summit in Sydney this month, Gartner vice president and distinguished analyst Janelle Hill said: “Significant changes in the BPMS marketplace over the last two years have altered the market landscape, especially growing interest in open-source BPM-enabling technologies, market consolidation driven by several acquisitions and the advent of next-generation intelligent BPMSs (iBPMSs). The market is now mainstream and experiencing continued, healthy growth.”

Total revenue in the global BPMS software market is expected to grow at a compound annual growth rate of 10 percent over the next five years, according to Gartner analysts. Although the BPMS mainstream market continues to grow, it is maturing and changing. Gartner market research has shown that the market grew at double-digit annual percentage rates for every year between 2006 and 2010 before slowing to a single-digit rate of 9.7% in 2011. This slightly slower growth can be attributed to economic conditions and a maturing market, as well as to consolidation driven by recent acquisitions.

Several significant changes have occurred during the past two years. Once a leader, Adobe made a major step away from the market in late 2011 when it announced that it would ramp down its investment in its LiveCycle BPMS and restrict its focus to the public sector and financial services. 

Progress Software made a similar shift in 2012 with its sale of Savvion, a Leader in Gartner's 2010 BPMS Magic Quadrant. Other significant changes include several acquisitions of BPMS vendors or products.

“As public companies in a market full of privately held companies, these exits have raised red flags for customers and prospects, and will impact overall market revenue growth,” said Ms. Hill. 

“Some of this installed base may be replaced in the two years following these vendors' announcements. Despite consolidation pressures; however, we also continue to see many new BPMS market entrants.”

Another significant trend has been the growing interest in open-source, BPM-enabling technologies. BonitaSoft, for example, was founded just three years ago and has already reached more than 1.5 million downloads of its open-source BPMS. Red Hat also acquired Barcelona-based Polymita, highlighting its recent acceleration of its move into the open-source BPMS market with technology that compliments jBPM. 

In addition, an open-source ECM vendor Alfresco, has an open-source workflow engine project called Activiti.org. Gartner has seen an increase in BPM client inquiries about these market developments.

The advent of the next generation of BPMSs (iBPMSs) has also affected the market. An iBPMS expands traditional BPMS capabilities by adding new functionality, such as near-real-time process intelligence, advanced and embedded analytics, complex-event processing (CEP), support for social collaboration and support for mobility. A number of vendors have updated their products to become iBPMSs.

“Business managers and knowledge workers are being asked to make faster and better decisions in an ever-changing business context; however, they cannot do so without improved visibility into their operations and environments,” said Ms. Hill. 

“To meet this challenge, leading organisations are seeking to make their business operations more intelligent by integrating analytics into their processes and the applications that enable them. This trend towards intelligent business operations represents a significant shift in BPM tool capabilities and is being adopted rapidly.”

Additional information is available in the report "Market Update: Match BPMS Vendors to Your Usage Scenarios." The report is available on Gartner's website at http://www.gartner.com/resId=2287820