Security and the Future of Trust

Security is a business enabler

Driven by a business-outcome focus, cyber security is seen as a business enabler rather than a blocker by 69% of European organizations. At the same time, European security teams are emphasizing the benefits of trust when demonstrating how security can support the business with achieving its strategic objectives.

IDC’s European Security research helps businesses to answer questions including:

  • What are the defining trends of the European security market (including services) and how do they compare with other regions?
  • What security challenges and opportunities are emerging from these defining trends?
  • How do our security technologies, strategies, or services resonate with European buyers and suppliers?
  • How can security be positioned as a business enabler, and how can security leaders build their business influence with other lines of business and C-Suite executives?

How we create valuable insight for you

  • Regular product and industry briefings and data collection: This allows us to offer an informed perspective on how the European security technologies and services markets are evolving.
  • Constant engagement with tech buyers: This allows us to develop informed regional and country- and product-specific perspectives on what security buyers want, and why.
  • Take the long view: IDC’s security insights and data have been developed over many years. We know that both security buyers and sellers often have to move fast, but they want to base their decisions on long-term experience and deep insight. This is what we offer to you.

IDC’s European Research Offerings

Learn more about Security from our experts.

Research Programs

IDC’s European Security research offers insight and guidance on key challenges that organizations face when building business strategies and implementing security technologies and services.

Research includes:

Learn more about IDC’s European Security Research

Macroeconomic Centre of Excellence

Winds of change can be defined as external forces shaping the market, either we are considering the whole market or the IT market. These forces have been in place for several months and years: at the beginning they were thought to be transient and not connected, but the current scenario proves it wrong.

  • They are company-specific, i.e., they affect companies differently

  • They are not temporary, i.e., they are here to stay, although they might change form

  • They are not standalone, i.e., they do not come alone

  • They are all interconnected, i.e., they influence and exacerbated each other

How IDC can help you: our products for a successful market strategy

  • IDC Blackbook & Spending Guides

    Learn where the main opportunities are in the ICT market to outline your go-to-market strategy

  • IDC IT Wallet

    Find out what are the major investment categories organziations are pushing on

  • IDC Economic Impact Model

    Evaluate the impact of your business on the overall society

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Futurescape 2025

Creating the Sustainable AI-fueled Business of the Future

  • Building an AI-Fueled Business

    AI will generate a cumulative global impact of $19.9 trillion by 2030; the potential is great, but the risks are significant.

    The past two years have been marked by the rising enthusiasm of business executives for the opportunities and promises presented by GenAI to reimagine business and operating models and drive sustainable business value.

    What stands out in EMEA is that an overwhelming 99% of CEOs have identified “using AI responsibly” as a paramount priority for their organizations. Accordingly, there has been a lot of activity around creating an AI strategy and embarking on significant use case innovation.

    However, only 13% of the proofs of concept run by organizations in the past 12 months successfully made it to production. Are your Board and C-Suite Team of CIOs, CTOs, and CXOs ready for AI value realization?

    Join this session to discover the top predictions for EMEA in 2025 and beyond and get guidance for achieving sustainable business value with AI.

  • Learn more about IDC’s AI Thought Leadership in Europe

    Discover how AI is transforming business and learn how to create an AI strategy that delivers sustainable competitive advantage

Register for IDC EMEA FutureScape 2025 now!

Emerging Technologies in Europe

The IDC EMEA Emtech Radar offers a glimpse into the developmental stages of the investigated technologies across three time horizons, which were determined by user expectations as to when these technologies will achieve broader adoption.

We have identified three main features that a technology needs to coexist in order to be defined as emerging technology

The technology needs to be in an early stage, meaning that:

  • It is beyond the conceptual phase
  • It is still in the development phase
  • It already has a real business application

Changing the status quo

The technology must be able to change the status quo. It must be able to provide new way of working and living.

For example, industrial AR/VR solutions. Which are changing the way how employees are carrying out maintenance processes in manufacturing. And how training in the healthcare sector is provided, for example surgical training.

Broad but still uncertain impact

We either refer to broad impact in terms of the industry scope, or broad in the number of applications it has in the same industry.

Those applications are, however, uncertain, meaning that they can be either uncertain in the outcome, or in the fact that they bear some potential risks.

Key uses for Emerging Technologies

  • Next-Level CX

    Raiffeisen Informatik has deployed Juniper solutions to modernize and automate its network infrastructure to provide exceptional services for its customers.

  • Connected Enterprise

    T-Mobile and Deutsche Telekom launched T-loT, a distruptive new loT solution designed to simplify global loT connectivity for enterprises

  • Digitized Logistics

    Digitization of logistics though ioT and AI systems to improve efficiency and sustainability, as well as to monitor goods flows to order processing – all from a single source

  • Enhanced Computation

    In 2022, HSBC and IBM announced that they will work together on exploring applications for quantum computing in financial services.

  • Intelligence Everywhere

    IBM partners with Adobe, around the use of artificial intelligence-powered weather data from The Weather Company, an IBM Business, on the Adobe Experience Platform

  • Technology With Purpose

    Robotics and ML for waste management to allow for smaller, more precise, safer, and profitable demolition recycling.

New trends to keep an eye on

  • Deep Tech

    Deep tech refers to those technologies that are based on high tech innovation in engineering, or significant scientific advances. Deep tech applications aim at achieving real improvement in human lives and society, rather than business improvement.

  • Quantum Computing

    Quantum computing harnesses and exploits quantum mechanics like superposition and entanglement to manipulate enormous combinations of states at once for computations and to process information on a large scale.

  • Multimodal AI

    A new AI paradigm in which various data types are combined with multiple intelligence processing algorithms to achieve higher performance levels in terms of accuracy, context, experiences, and insights for various business processes across industries.

Our research focus areas

5G

Given the speeds and capacity that 5G networks promise, they have the potential to be an indispensable technology to accelerate digital transformation and innovation.
5G is the fifth generation mobile network, and will usher in the fourth industrial revolution and change the economy.

loT

Internet of Things (IoT) refers to the network of smart, interconnected devices and services that are capable of sensing or even listening to requests.
IoT solutions can be leveraged for many tasks, ranging from connecting devices, systems, and people, or simply exchanging data, to intelligent, real-world applications enabling environments such as factories and smart cities.

Block Chain

Blockchain is a type of distributed ledger technology in which transactions are recorded with an immutable cryptographic signature.
It is the perfect technology for organizations looking for more trust, security, transparency, and traceability of data shared across a business network, achieving cost savings and new efficiencies.

Biometrics

Biometrics is the most suitable means of identifying and authenticating individuals reliably and quickly. Unique biological characteristics, such as fingerprints, iris scans, facial recognition, and voice are highly valued identifiers because they are universal, specific, measurable, and documentable. And unlike passwords, KYC responses or authentication tokens, users can’t forget or misplace their biometrics.

AR/VR

Augmented and virtual reality represent a major revolution in the way we interact with computers. From remote team collaboration to training and industrial maintenance, this technology is revolutionizing how we look at the world.

Quantum computing

Quantum computing is defined as a technology that harnesses and exploits quantum mechanics like superposition and entanglement to manipulate enormous combinations of states at once for computations and to process information on a large scale. There are many areas in which the superior power and intelligence of quantum technologies can be leveraged, from technology and hospitality to defense and construction.

Edge Computing

Edge computing is a distributed computing framework that brings enterprise applications closer to data sources such as IoT devices or local edge servers.
This proximity to data at its source can deliver strong business benefits, including faster insights, improved response times, and better bandwidth availability.

Robotics

Robots are widely used in industries such as automobile manufacture to perform simple repetitive tasks and in industries where work must be performed in environments that are hazardous to humans.
Enhanced safety, speed, and higher productivity are just a few of the many advantages that organizations achieve through this technology.

AI

Artificial intelligence is the basis for mimicking human intelligence processes through the creation and application of algorithms built into a dynamic computing environment. It forms the basis for all computer learning and is the future of all complex decision making, leveraging the incredible amount of data generated by both humans and machines.

Meet the team

Image of Meet the Team

Meet the Team

Senior research analyst

Image of Gabriele Roberti

Gabriele Roberti

Senior research manager, IoT and Edge practice lead

Image of Stefano Perini

Stefano Perini

Senior research analyst, Quantum Computing launchpad lead

Image of Giulia Carosella

Giulia Carosella

Research manager, European Digital Transformation practice lead

Image of Neil Ward-Dutton

Neil Ward-Dutton

Vice president, Artificial Intelligence practice lead

Image of Francesca Ciarletta

Francesca Ciarletta

Group Vice President, Investment Research

Image of Lapo Fioretti

Lapo Fioretti

Senior Research Analyst, Emerging Technologies and Macroeconomics

Image of Andrea Minonne

Andrea Minonne

Senior research analyst, Augmented Humanity launchpad lead

Image of Alexandra Rotaru

Alexandra Rotaru

Research analyst

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AI, Automation, Data and Analytics

Strategies for business success

AI, Automation, Data and Analytics technologies are driving huge changes in how organizations connect with customers, create and deliver products and services, execute their internal business operations, make decisions and integrate with partners and suppliers. They are core enablers of digital business success – and what’s more, developments in each of these areas are increasingly interwoven, with new strategic roles for data as the foundation.

IDC’s AI, Automation, Data and Analytics Research helps organizations:

  • Understand the dynamics of fast-moving Generative AI technologies and all the markets they impact.
  • Understand how AI technologies and other critical innovations are influencing data platforms, analytics tools, and automation platforms.
  • Understand how European organizations are adopting all these technologies and using them to deliver real business value.
  • Get a handle on the key factors that shape European markets in these areas – including regulations, skills and implementation ecosystem availability, sovereignty concerns, and cultural factors.

Our research approach focuses not only on the four core technology spaces of AI, automation, analytics and data platforms; we also prioritize exploration of the intersections between these technology spaces (see left for key examples).

  • We run four European research programs that support specialist software platform and tools vendors, application software vendors, infrastructure providers, professional services providers and enterprises through written research and one-to-one inquiry sessions. Our team works collaboratively across these research programs, to ensure we can address key intersectional issues and trends effectively and quickly.
  • European Data from IDC’s Worldwide AI and Generative AI Spending Guide and Software Tracker products give clients deep quantitative insights into past, present and future demand across multiple technology markets, countries and regions, and use cases.
  • We deliver dozens of custom projects annually that guide vendor internal strategy development through deep competitor and customer analysis, including detailed total addressable market studies; guide buyers with insightful and provocative thought leadership programs; and enable and educate vendors’ sales and go-to-market teams.
  • IDC’s experienced analysts regularly present leading market insights at industry events across the region and more widely – including across a packed calendar of Foundry and IDC events.

IDC’s AI, Automation, Data and Analytics offerings

Learn more about AI, Automation, Data and Analytics from our experts.

Research programs

IDC’s AI, Automation, Data and Analytics research offers thought leadership and advice on key challenges organizations face when building business strategies and implementing these technologies.

Research includes:

Learn more about IDC’s Automation, AI and Analytics Research

Explore IDC resources

IDC is committed to helping our customers make informed decisions through timely analyst insights and unmatched data.

Explore all resources

Security

Macroeconomic Centre of Excellence

Futurescape

Emerging Technologies

Artificial Intelligence

Resource Center – Home

Research & Advisory

IT Service Cost Management

Economics

Agile value management for Cooperatie DELA

Critical information that supports your technology roadmap

Our research and advisory services are backed by analyst experts from around the world who are committed to providing you with the right information for every stage of your technology roadmap.

With Research and Advisory Services, you will:

  • Align IT etrategy to meet goals

    • Plan and implement digital transformation strategies with industry expertise from our global analysts.
    • Validate conclusions and identify risks early on based on accurate, relevant data.
    • Plan to meet company goals with guidance from our rigorous research methodology.
  • Innovate with the latest tech trends

    • Improve operation strategies with one-to-one guidance from IDC analysts.
    • Evaluate current digital positioning and develop a clearly defined digital strategy based on accurate, relevant data.
    • Meet company goals with guidance from our rigorous research methodology.
  • Drive digital growth

    • Access research based on carefully curated data tailored to guide you in your digital roadmaps.
    • Implement a digital transformation strategy based on the latest research designed to provide you with the information you need.
    • Promote innovation and new ideas by unlocking the latest technology trends uncovered by our global analysts.
  • Make better decisions

    • Confidently make technology purchases by consulting one-on-one with our analysts to validate conclusions and better understand risks.
    • Access the latest research and metrics from our global team of analysts, based on rigorous research methodology.

IDC IT Executive Programs

Research and Advisory includes the IT Executive Programs that allow you to talk one-on-one with global analysts who are devoted to providing the right information for every stage of your needs.

Develop your roadmap

With our research document methodology, IDC DecisionScapes, you can make data-driven decisions that reduce risk and time to implement while staying ahead of the curve.

Get trusted advisors

IDC has a long and trusted history in the research field. For over 50 years, we’ve provided unbiased, vendor-agnostic advice. We’re devoted to providing information that truly helps your planning and organization and validate your decisions.

Move with speed

Desktop or mobile, country-based or global, planning or implementation, industry specificity or broad technologies – IDC covers a wide spectrum. With the quickest response times in the industry, you get relevant answers easily and without hassle or nickel and diming.

IDC Industry Insights

Industry Insights assists business and IT leaders in making technology decisions with insightful, fact-based research and consulting services. Get industry research grounded in decades of experience from our global senior analyst team across six industries: retail, government, financial services, manufacturing, health and energy.

Interested in learning more about IDC’s Tech Buyer solutions?

Improve Technology Cost and Performance Delivery through Peer and Outsourced Services Benchmarking

IT organizations struggle with duplication of services, tech debt, high cost, and inefficiency. Many IT leaders are challenged in demonstrating value to the business and validating their budgets. IDC benchmarks the cost efficiencies of your internal technology services (or parts) against peer organizations or outsourced options to drive change.

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How We Bring You the Value Our Competitors Don't?

Enterprise technology proliferates, whether due to mergers, new services, product requirements, or to meet unique divisional requirements and performance assessments, aggregating results into broad categories. Rapid growth and diversity of IT technology causes proliferation and duplication over time. Technology leadership often loses visibility over IT services offered, which drives duplication, increased expense, technology debt, and inefficiency.

Other consultancies deliver top-down cost and performance assessments, which means they aggregate results into broad categories. This means that specific areas of high cost and efficiency are hidden by averaging into a broad category. Your infrastructure costs may match the market because your cheap storage costs are off-set by your high cost of networking. Don’t you want to know what’s driving cost issues at a level granular enough to fix?

Drive down your IT costs, improve performance, identify opportunities through a data-driven approach that provides actionable insights and recommendations benchmarked against peers.

  • How can I validate my budget to the business?
  • Where am I inefficient?
  • How can I advocate for additional budget investments?

How Will It Impact Your Company?

  • 30%

    Of organizations spend too much on IT

  • 10%

    Cost reduction on average

  •  

    Redirect investment from inefficiency to competitive capabilities

What benefits it brings?

  • IDC’s Special Sauce

    Data is collected data across four dimensions:

    • Volume – higher volumes bring economies of scale in cost/price
    • Complexity – complexity drives increased costs/price
    • Quality – higher service levels increase costs/price service
    • Performance – the more extensive the scope of the activities within a service the costs/price
  • A key value proposition: Component-based measurement

    Component-based analysis (CBA) ensures that the service structure is not lost during aggregation into broad service delivery towers. With benchmarking at the component level, components are tailored from the peers to accurately match your unique business and technology priorities. Results are transparent and easy to interpret.

     

Get Complete Visibility and Control of Your Cloud Expenses

The striking shift towards cloud in the past few years reflects the compelling benefits to expanding cloud initiatives. With its ability to fuel agility and innovation, cloud initiatives are key factors in most digital transformation (DX) efforts. Despite this, IDC estimates that 10-30% of cloud spending is wasted,* even as companies plan on spending more on cloud.

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What Can We Do For You?

Cloud Economics Framework

Visibility

IDC understands that how your cloud is contracted, structured and used is key to its value delivery to your organization.

Recommendations

We deliver actionable, targeted recommendations. These recommendations identify key areas for improvement and their associated benefits. Action Based.

Cloud Economics gets you cost and performance value from your technology investments
  • Cost management and efficiency
  • Forecasting
  • Unused resources
  • Workload optimization
  • Discount options and licensing
  • Multi-cloud cost optimization
  • Tying costs to utilization
  • Continuous improvement
  • CSP cost benchmarking

How Will It Impact Your Company?

  • 25%

    Cost Reduction In One Year

  • 50%

    Defect Reduction During Test Phases

  • 60%

    Lower Incident Volumes In One Year

What benefits it brings?

  • Business Benefits

    45% of organizations consider cloud expenditures their top IT expenditure priority, even as 90% consider reigning in the cost of IT delivery as a priority*. (****IDC Future Enterprise Resiliency & Spending Survey – Wave 1, February 2022, n=798) Flexibility is a key benefit of cloud, but cloud complexity makes it challenging to control costs without choking that agility. Many organizations put in place cost control mechanisms that defeat much of cloud’s value.

  • What You Get Assess

    Assess

    • Contracts and product

    Communicate

    • Billing and monitoring data
    • Cost data
    • Solutions
    • Forecasting

    Analyze

    • Workloads and utilization
    • Licensing
    • Performance and sizing
    • Architecture

    Inventory

    • Billing data
    • Monitoring data
    • Architecture

    Monitor

    • Cost outliers and cost benchmarking
    • Optimization of workloads and cost

Agile Value Management for Coöperatie DELA

About Customer

Coöperatie DELA is originally an Eindhoven funeral insurer and caretaker that was founded on March 11, 1937 as funeral association Draagt Elkander’s Lasten. DELA is a not-for-profit cooperative. It is the largest funeral insurer in the Netherlands and Belgium. In 2019, Coöperatie DELA comprises 21 crematoria and 54 funeral homes in the Netherlands and 3 crematoria and 59 funeral homes in Belgium.

Unlike other insurer offerings, most funeral policies of the DELA cooperative don’t pay out in cash. The funeral can be arranged to be entirely the insured wishes and with certain tyon how it gets paid for.

Summary

Agile practices in application development have seen massive adoption over recent years.

Coöperatie DELA is at the forefront of maturing Agile application development and quality assurance practices. The IDC Metri Agile Value Management (AVM) service measures the value produced, including the product quality, created by Agile and/or DevOps teams using standardized metrics. This allows us to compare and benchmark team performance and product quality. In this customer story we show how Agile Value Management was used to measure and improve the team performance of an external (and partly nearshore) team that develops and maintains the Reservation System of DELA.

Periodic measurements show a gradual and significant improvement of both team performance (compared to market averages) and the quality of the application. Overall Agile Value Management provides the benefit of code quality improvement to manage productivity, delivery speed and cost efficiency of development teams.