Contract Life-Cycle Management Attracts New Entrants

CIOs and their business partners are increasingly looking for contract life-cycle management (CLM) solutions for all of their businesses' contracts, even if they deploy them in stages for buy-side contracts first and later for sell-side contracts. The result? A fast-growing (21% CAGR from 2003 to 2008), fragmented (with at least 16 vendors that we are aware of), and dynamic (with new entrants and acquisitions of existing vendors) market. Specialist vendors like I-many, Nextance, Selectica, and Upside Software (along with smaller vendors like CMA Contiki, Ecteon, Omniware, and Symfact) still have a near-majority share, but buy-side or ePurchasing vendors like Ariba, Emptoris, and Procuri are major presences. Oracle is the largest single vendor, although with just an 18% share, and has now been joined by SAP. Open Text, through its acquisition of Hummingbird, is the first of what are likely to be several enterprise content management (ECM) vendors in the market.