Flexera Software

What significant changes did your sector witness in 2013? What did these changes mean to vendors and customers?

Enterprises that have taken control back over their license management saw as much as 30 percent reduction in software spend, which is one of the largest line items in the IT budget. We also saw IT Departments completely subsumed with and overwhelmed by requirements for self service, BYOD and mobile support that further strained the IT organization, leading to the need for application readiness solutions to include an application portal and mobile app capabilities.

 What are some of the changes you had anticipated would happen in 2013, but did not happen?

Many of the trends predicted for 2013 are happening, just at a more measured place.  For instance, desktop virtualization, BYOD, consumerization of IT, etc., are all taking hold within the organization – yet most enterprises are still grappling with how they’ll maintain accountability and control in those environments while still giving users what they want. 

Can you paint us the picture of how the landscape will change in 2014? What are some of the broader trends you are closely watching?

More Licensing Options: Over the course of the next year the number of licensing model varieties will increase, including usage-based models. Usage-based Licensing Models Appear in All Application Types: Companies are getting more sophisticated around how they want to pay for software.  They want costs to align more closely with how they’re using it and deriving value from it Software License Optimization Options Expand: Software License Optimization has emerged as an important technology category. Vendors Start Making Money From M2M: The Machine to Machine movement promises vast new opportunities as devices become smart and can start communicating and sharing data with one another. 

Can you highlight how the customer spends in the industry will change in 2014? What makes you think customers will be buying more/ less?

According to recent reports, 44 percent of enterprises surveyed indicated that their budgets for software would increase over the course of the next 18-24 months, a slight increase in the software budget growth predictions in 2011 (43 percent) and 2010 (33 percent). 

What's in store for your company in 2014?

Flexera Software continues our year over year double digit growth.  This is largely because applications have become so strategic to the enterprise, that application usage management has taken central stage.