Category: Business Data Services
Accenture, Capgemini, Genpact, IBM, Infosys, TCS—the F&A entourage leading the way to Horizon 3 outcomes
HFS conducted an exhaustive research exercise into 15 of the key service providers in the latest Horizons report on F&A Service Providers, 2023, by diving deep into the capabilities of each and how they have contributed to the changing F&A landscape over the last year. Read More
Disrupt or be disrupted: The soaring pace of innovation in payments
HFS launches its first-ever cards and payments Horizons report. Payments demonstrate the fastest innovation cycles in BFS and are in a constant state of disruption as digital models decimate the cost and data intelligence capabilities of legacy systems. Payments-industry shifts are forcing incumbents to work harder to capture growth, pick up the pace of digitization, gain economies of scale, and manage risk—all while contributing to innovation. These demands can be overwhelming, but the potential for growth and innovation in the payments space is real. Therefore, attracting new players in great numbers, crowding the market, and raising the competitive stakes.Read More
The hegemony-obsessed platform economy is scouting for credible provider partners
The last decade-plus has seen the ascendancy of platform businesses like Uber, Netflix, Amazon, Facebook, Google, and Spotify and today, six of the top 10 global businesses by market capitalization are platform businesses. The Services for the Platform Economy, 2023 Horizons report covers seven notable providers helping their platform clients efficiently run operations, expand business, and realize value.Read More
IBM’s acquisition of Apptio can shine if IBM Software and IBM Consulting work together to deliver cost-managed innovation at speed
HFS believes this is a good deal for both IBM and Apptio. IBM didn’t have much spend data; therefore, there is little overlap in terms of products. The ambition is bold. But the Holy Grail of operations is having an operational single pane of glass that includes automation and AI. If IBM can integrate all those acquisitions and get all that telemetry data out of its often highly specific domains, it can achieve strong differentiation in the market. Conversely, Apptio had hit a sales plateau as it struggled to scale its sales reach. Getting $4.6bn for hitting a plateau is too good an opportunity to turn down.Read More
IBM Watson missed the AI revolution, but Watsonx could become the heartbeat of the Generative Enterprise
IBM unveiled its multi-model and multi-cloud Watsonx to drive AI-first enterprises - what we are calling "The Generative Enterprise" at HFS. IBM is describing the platform as a "full technology stack" for training, tuning, and deploying AI models, including foundation and large language models while ensuring tight data governance controls. In our view, Watsonx is the first enterprise-grade offering to address the Generative Enterprise holistically. Here’s our interpretation of WatsonxRead More
Who’s leading the pack for strategic finance services?
The HFS Strategic Finance Horizons report analyzes services provider capabilities shaping the financial planning and analysis industry and their proven capabilities to help their enterprise customers access critical financial data at speed. HFS assessed 13 major service providers' prowess in the strategic areas of FP&A. Read More
2023 is the year of ‘The Autonomous Enterprise’ as economics trigger change
Inflation-driven pressures will likely culminate in a huge wave of job reductions, sparking the demand for autonomous technologies to fill the voidRead More
2023 will provide a huge opportunity for automation service providers… so how do they stack up?
The economic conditions in 2023 will put automation in the hot seat, and expectations are on operations leaders to roll out automation initiatives. So one thing is clear, most organizations will need a lot of help to roll out real automations that perform more than basic RPA - they need to evaluate automation and AI technologies across the board to move their organizations forward across our three Horizons.Read More
New HFS Horizons Report! Healthcare Payer Service Providers are all about the right fit
In October 2022, HFS said goodbye to the Top 10s and welcomed HFS Horizons, a forward-looking construct to evaluate service providers. Our first industry focused horizon report is the healthcare payer service provider report that was published in November 2022. This report helps healthcare enterprise buyers make high-confidence buying and partnering decisions in the context of the specific challenges they are attempting to address. Read More
re:Invent or re:Position? AWS tries to ‘out Google’ Google on the importance of your data strategy
AWS could lose steam as the migration to the cloud, as a technology platform, gives way to the cloud’s role in making data a business asset. While AWS's growth numbers are still holding up, there could be significant changes on the horizon as Google Cloud Platform (GCP) makes up lost ground with its approach to a data-centric cloud environment.Read More