Between 2023 and August 2025, European IT services buyers fundamentally reordered their priorities. AI capabilities jumped from sixth place to first. Digital expertise became foundational rather than leading. The shift wasn’t gradual. It signaled a market that had moved into new territory.
IDC’s survey of 700 European organisations in August 2025 captured this reordering of service provider selection criteria. When compared with the same evaluation criteria from 2023, the changes were clear. European firms were demanding AI capabilities as a core competency.
AI capabilities ranked sixth in 2023. By August 2025, they ranked first.
Three years ago, when European IT services buyers were asked what mattered most in selecting a strategic services partner, AI and generative AI capabilities ranked sixth on their priority list. By August 2025, they had moved to the top. This reflected a real shift in how European organisations had come to think about the value their partners could deliver.
Most organisations had experimented with AI tools by 2025. Many had run pilots. Few had successfully redesigned core processes to use AI at scale, which is where they needed their services partners to step in and help them navigate that gap. The implication for services providers was that AI competency could not be a future roadmap item. Buyers expected to see real AI capabilities embedded across the services portfolio, and for EMEA services providers, this had become a baseline expectation, not differentiation.
Future technology trends ranked third. European firms wanted guidance, not just delivery
The third leading criterion in the August 2025 survey revealed something practical about buyer psychology: European organisations needed their IT services partners to act as trusted advisors on what was coming next. Firms often have limited internal bandwidth to stay informed about emerging technologies, to evaluate competing options, and to understand which trends genuinely mattered for their industry versus which were hype. They needed technology partners who could close that gap.
The buyer conversation had fundamentally shifted. They weren’t just asking “Can you build this?” They were asking “What should we build? What’s the market doing? What’s coming next, and what does it mean for our business?” Services vendors who could articulate a credible point of view on technology strategy, backed by real market insight, and more importantly, experience, had a competitive advantage.
Industry expertise and innovation rounded out the top selection criteria
The August 2025 survey showed industry expertise and a proven track record of helping clients innovate completed the top five selection criteria for European services buyers. These weren’t new requirements, but by 2025, their context had shifted. What counted as innovative five years earlier often didn’t anymore. Industry expertise that was purely historical wasn’t sufficient either.
European buyers were looking for services partners who combined deep industry knowledge with current thinking about how that domain was being reshaped by AI, regulatory change, and competitive disruption. For services vendors, the implication was clear: industry specialists needed to understand how AI was changing their sector, which business processes were good candidates for AI-led transformation, and why generic industry knowledge wasn’t a sufficient competitive base anymore.
What’s changed since then
The shift between 2023 and August 2025 was clear, but the services market doesn’t stand still. The real question is what happened in the 12 months that followed. Did European IT services buyers continue to demand more from their providers? Did AI capabilities stay at the top of the evaluation criteria, or have buyer priorities shifted further? Have services vendors made the repositioning moves that seemed necessary in late 2025? Have new evaluation criteria emerged? And critically: how have these changing priorities affected actual vendor selection decisions across EMEA?
These aren’t abstract questions. For services vendors, the answers determine whether your current positioning is ahead of the market or reacting to it. For services buyers, they determine how you should be evaluating partners right now.
On 6 October, IDC is presenting updated research that answers these questions with fresh data on how EMEA services buyer requirements have evolved. If you’re involved in selecting IT services partners, or if you’re positioning your services business to win in both today’s and tomorrow’s market, this is when you’ll get the insights you need.
This blog draws on IDC’s EMEA IT Services Survey conducted in August 2025 (n=700, Europe).