Worldwide Automated Software Quality Market Shares, 2021: Enabling DevOps Velocity and Digital Execution

Worldwide Automated Software Quality Market Shares, 2021: Enabling DevOps Velocity and Digital Execution

This IDC study provides an analysis of the 2021 automated software quality (ASQ) vendor market share. It discusses IDC's ASQ assessment with specific vendor analysis for a market that evolved to improved double-digit growth of 10.4% to $3.4 billion in 2021 (as compared with 6.8% growth to $3.1 billion in 2020). Organizations invested deeply in ASQ solutions to address increased software delivery complexity and velocity driven by a variety of vectors (including business, technology, software sourcing, and diverse platform deployment, collaboration, and cloud demands). Enhanced and evolving analytics with machine learning (ML) and artificial intelligence (AI) and emerging leverage of robotic process automation (RPA) improved ease of access and data leverage. All major share ASQ solution providers experienced some revenue increases because of significant digital innovation and DevOps engagement, in the context of competitive pressures for high-quality, secure software delivery and a global economy that remained volatile and unpredictable. This market growth occurred even with the challenges of evolving product releases, shifts to cloud delivery models, acquisition transitions, and encroachment by open source tools. Major revenue player Micro Focus, at 11.2% share (down from Micro Focus' 12.3% revenue share in 2020), held steady overall with an IDC estimated growth of 0.2%. Microsoft had growth of 8.9% and stable share at 7.9%. IBM, at 6.5% share, experienced growth of 3.6% in 2021, according to IDC estimates. Midsize innovative vendors in emerging technology areas such as mobile, code analytics, software quality analysis and measurement (SQAM) and application security testing (AST), and cloud testing contributed to improved ASQ growth in 2021. We are also observing the impact of OSS usage and integration by vendors (such as Selenium and Cucumber). We also saw acquisitions during 2021 and in 1H22. Longer term and moving into 2H22, the ASQ market is slated for an overall trajectory of growth. IDC expects ongoing acquisitions in the near term as enterprise providers seek to broaden their ASQ portfolios and as organizations must respond to increasing levels of technology and edge platform complexity while driving innovation with hybrid work."In a global economy that experienced ongoing volatility with the continuing global health crisis during 2021, demand for digitization and rapid delivery of high-quality software saw increased investment and demand for ASQ solutions and double-digit growth, along with acquisitions and shifting of major vendor allocations for enterprise ASQ. Market and product evolution occurred as innovators executed high growth and larger vendors delivered more complete quality and life-cycle management solutions, and consolidation continues," says Melinda Ballou, research director for Agile ALM, Quality, and Portfolio Strategies at IDC. "As a result of the earlier disruption and ongoing software quality challenges, we saw increased ASQ investments. Smaller vendors continue to play a crucial role for market innovation, as exemplified in cross-stack testing, quality measurement with static and dynamic analyses and security leverage, and agile, embedded, and mobile solutions; while these areas have been dominated by small and medium-sized companies, we see enterprise and suite providers engaging as well. We expect additional acquisitions, and despite a volatile worldwide economic outlook resulting from the geopolitical conflict, environment challenges, and the ongoing pandemic, we expect ASQ growth in the 2022–2025 time frame."

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