Customer and market expectations are changing significantly, driving a fundamental reconsideration of how organizations should structure themselves, their relationships, and their products and services. In this environment, opportunities for creating successful services and software to support these organizations often emerge at the intersection of a company's aspirations and its ability to execute. IDC's Services and Software Leading Indicators service uncovers the strategic business issues facing top senior business and IT executives, analyzes planned near-term actions, and assesses where there are underlying needs and which solutions top executives will be most willing to allocate budget for. The research also analyzes the strategies and preferences CIOs will use to accommodate these actions as they work with services and software providers. This research helps subscribers identify emerging opportunities, validate current directions, uncover strategy shifts, and benchmark their own approach to IT investing as related to business goals. Subscribers to this service receive direct access to IDC's top industry experts, who can supply competitive analysis and positioning advice, identify strategic partnering opportunities, assist with speaking to the investment community, provide press quotes, and more.

This service covers the following:

• Changing business objectives of midsize and large organizations
• Prioritization of corporate strategies, such as growth, cost control, risk mitigation, and market differentiation
• The role of business stakeholders in buying decisions
• Services and software investment expectations
• Evaluation criteria for services and software vendors

Throughout the year, this service will address the following topics:

• Gap analysis and identification of pain points by key market segments
• Maturity analysis framework
• Impact of changing priorities on services and software investments and implementation options
• Emerging services and software opportunities

Our research addresses the following issues that are critical to your success:

1. What are the top enterprise strategic business drivers and concerns from a senior-level perspective?
2. How are companies intending to use new services and software investments to drive company agendas, especially growth?
3. How are organizational dynamics changing in enterprises and wielding influence on technology adoption behaviors?
4. How are business and IT stakeholders aligning to address enterprise goals?
5. How do senior executives want to engage with services and software providers, and how do they participate by role in buying decisions?
6. How do perceptions and approaches to services and software investments vary by an individual's role or market segment?

IDC's Services and Software Leading Indicators service examines the planned strategic directions and concerns of senior executives in order to predict future services and software market opportunities.

Throughout the year, this service will offer insight into the latest trends impacting the market. Potential studies include:

A progressive framework of demand-side research explores many dimensions of business and IT trends influencing services and software opportunities. These studies explore multiple roles within the enterprise and each of their perspectives into how and where technology will or needs to be leveraged. Both qualitative and quantitative analysis of study results are provided, including implications and advice to vendors and enterprises.

Subscribers receive reports and presentations highlighting findings from in-depth interviews with business and IT C-level executives for their views into business priorities, technology investments, decision behaviors, vendor preferences and satisfaction assessments, external sourcing plans, IT structure and funding patterns, and more.

Webcasts are interactive sessions with key IDC analysts providing analysis and varying perspectives from study findings. These Webcasts are recorded, allowing subscribers to listen to the replays and presentations afterward and share findings with colleagues.

IDC offers a complete market intelligence solution customized to meet your business requirements. The array of products and services available to you includes:

• The opportunity to have your specific questions answered through personal interaction with industry experts who cover the topics and markets in your service
• Around-the-clock access to our market intelligence on idc.com, IDC's personalized Web experience
• A view of the market's future with 12 months of continuous intelligence about its direction and the reasons behind it, along with actionable advice for taking advantage of existing and emerging opportunities
• Special client discount pricing on purchases of research from other services
• Complimentary admission to IDC's annual Directions conference, where you'll hear our latest forecasts and network with IDC analysts and other industry professionals
• Complimentary invitations to monthly executive telebriefings, interactive forums designed to provide you with insights about research and strategies directly from IDC analysts

To find out how our flexible packaging options can meet your specific business needs, please contact your IDC sales executive.

As a privately held company, IDC believes that our customers are our primary constituency. A large percentage of every revenue dollar is reinvested back into our products, including more analysts, more geographic coverage, and extensive primary research.

Our steady growth over the past 10 years reflects our commitment to investing in our customers.