Last week, I took a long overdue look at the supply chain analyst community, centered to start around what may have been the peak of the analyst world in the early 2000s, with by my count at least 10 reasonably important firms. (See Analyzing the Supply Chain Analysts 2024.)
Since then there has been a decent amount of consolidation and attrition, by far most consequentially being Gartner’s 2009 acquisition of AMR, which changed everything. That leaves us with these firms still standing from my 2000 list in 2024:
• ARC Advisory Group
• Forrester
• IDC
• Gartner
Gilmore Says.... |
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| A final observation: There has been an almost complete demise of analysts writing any “negative” research/opinions on specific vendors. |
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Have there been any newer entrants to the supply chain analyst mix? Not many. I would reference a couple, including a firm called Interact Analysis that is doing some very good work in the warehouse automation space as well as other areas.
I would also throw into the mix a firm called IHL Group that is retail focused, but which does some nice research on Order Management and overall retail technology adoption, including supply chain.
But that’s about it. Am I missing anyone? The huge growth of Gartner has simply sucked a lot of the air out of the supply chain analyst landscape.
Switching gears, I often find many supply chain practitioners do not well understand the analyst community and how it works. So let’s take a quick look.
From my view, the SCM industry analyst firms can differ along these attributes:
Size and scope: Gartner is huge, some are very small, and others in-between. Some are very broad-based IT/technology analysts, others more narrowly focused on operations/supply chain.
How they Make Their Money: Some rely mostly on a client subscriber model, which is based on things like what specific services you subscribe to or how many research “seats” you buy. Gartner, IDC and Forrester use this model. Others rely primarily on vendor sponsorship of various reports and other activities. Some are in-between. A third group primarily makes money selling research reports, purchased by companies looking to understand the market for a given type of technology. An example would be an upcoming report from Interact Analysis (mentioned above) on warehouse automation software.
Content Access: Closely tied to “how they make their money,” in general, the subscription-based firms closely limit most content access only to clients and, even within clients, limit the number of people authorized to access the research though there are provisions for sharing internally. The companies that make money by vendor sponsorship generally make the research available with free registration. Increasingly, even some of the subscription-based analysts are making individual pieces of research available “by the drink.”
Subscriber Mix: Some analysts have primarily vendor clients, others have a high percentage of “end users” as clients. Some have no end-user clients.
Inquiry Opportunities: Related to all the above, some have formal programs for client inquiries (e.g., We are looking at these three demand planning vendors, what can you tell me?). How this works, in practice (ease of setting up an inquiry, quality of answers) can vary substantially. Usually only available from subscription-based firms.
A final observation: There has been an almost complete demise of analysts writing any “negative” research/opinions on specific vendors. In the 1990s, this was not uncommon, even though it brought fire and brimstone from any vendor receiving such criticism.
Today, the need to keep vendors as clients, and probably a desire to avoid the wrath of vendors, has largely eliminated any real criticism of vendors today, and that’s too really too bad, though I well understand those pressures (we have them here too in a different way.)
But, it is something to keep in mind, though most analysts will speak more freely in one-on-one inquiries. But, good luck finding any negative opinions in print today, though Gartner in its Magic Quadrants for various supply chain technologies (WMS, TMS, Supply Chain Planning, etc.) does provide some modest potential issue with each vendor covered in the report.
So the supply chain analyst world is much different that what it was 20+ years ago, which should be no surprise.
Hope you enjoyed this overview.
What is your reaction to these thoughts on this look at the analysts? What would you add? Let us know your thought at the Feedback section below.
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