Confirmed: Ovum has acquired RHK

Duncan Chapple has just confirmed on his blog, Analyst Equity, that Ovum's rumoured acquisition of RHK has gone ahead.

http://analystrelations.blogspot.com/2005/06/ovum-buys-rhk.html

Ovum to buy RHK?

Om Malik's reporting that Ovum is in talks to acquire RHK in the US.

Om Malik�s Broadband Blog � Consolidation comes to Telecom Research

Challenges (and benefits) of a changing analyst market

Andrew Smith's got an interesting post (http://www.bloglines.com/blog/andismit?id=189) about the publications that IT decision-makers actually read. It's not always what you would expect (in fact they seem to read very few IT titles, if any at all).

It's focused me on writing about some of the changes that are happening with the industry analysts and some of the questions that we're currently in the midst of answering.

Everyday, we're now actively engaged in challenging our own perceptions on the relative importance of analyst firms and individual analysts. We are constantly forcing ourselves to re-examine who has what knowledge and influence, how that is applied and how we can best help our clients make use of it.

We ask ourselves if Gartner's increasing size will actually result in an equal increase in influence. We don't think so. There will be an increase but not in a straight line proportion. There will also be some kind of backlash over its increasing dominance and the prices it charges.

We ask ourselves if there will be more consolidation among the likes of AMR, Forrester, Ovum and Yankee Group? Yes, because whether it's true or not, these companies are likely to believe they have to get bigger to effectively compete against Gartner for influence in the end-user market.

We ask ourselves if we will see the smaller analyst firms such as Quocirca (www.quocirca.com), Macehiter Ward-Dutton (www.mwdadvisors.com) and Redmonk (www.redmonk.com) gain more influence? Yes, because we believe firms are increasingly buying people rather than (as well as?) companies. Watch out for the rise of the 'individual' brand in the analyst market.

We're witnessing some interesting times in the IT industry analyst market at the moment. The changes will not make the AR job any easier in the short-term but it's forcing us to re-examine how influence works in the IT sector. It's also helping us get to understand how the role of the industry analyst is being re-defined.

Aberdeen comes top with end-users

A new survey from Azul Partners has Aberdeen ranked "as both the most insightful and valuable firm among end users."

But is everything as it appears? ARmadgeddon thinks there may be more to this than initally meets the eye...

ARmadgeddon: A new Aberdeen arises

A beer magic quadrant

I found this amusing - http://www.lwcresearch.com/filesfordownloads/beerquadrant.JPG

I meandered towards it via a series of blogs. Many thanks to:

Armadgeddon - http://armadgeddon.blogspot.com/2005/05/gartner-magic-quadrant.html
Louis Columbo - http://www.crmbuyer.com/story/42302.html, and
LWC Research http://www.lwcresearch.com

If you've not already seen them, the pieces on Gartner's Magic Quadrant by Armadgeddon and Louis are both well worth a read.

Introducing the Opinion Hype Cycle

Joe Guralnick at Gartner Watch takes a wry look at Gartner's Hype Cycle and introduces an interesting new variant...

Gartner Watch - Powered By Bloglines

Recap: Outsell on Gartner / META

I'm sure most people have seen this by now but I found it a useful summary of what Gartner did with META.

Outsell Now: What Happened to META?

Will and Richard

I had lunch yesterday with Will Arnold and Richard Laven. They are now running Performance Research Centre and provide the Apollo Analyst Database (along with a range of other media relations surveys, reports etc).

In their own words, "this service means you can target analysts, trace their relationships with the media, and gauge their standing within the media."

We've been using the service for a while now and it's proved very useful in helping us determine which analysts and journalists are interacting. It's particularly good at identifying which journalists are quoting which analysts.

If you're in the UK AR market you will undoubtedly know one or the other if not both. If you don't, then check out their website at http://www.apollosurveys.com

New retail analyst at IDC

Ivano Ortis has joined IDC as program manager for the EMEA Vertical Markets team.

Ivano is covering Retail and Transportation & Logistics in Western Europe.

Quocirca makes public sector hire

Quocirca has hired a new analyst. Elaine Axby will focus on "public sector IT and communications development."

Before joining Quocirca Elaine worked for Oftel, where she was responsible for mobile communications and Internet policy development, and at BT Cellnet, where she was marketing manager for its GSM network.

Analysts reject blogs, screws business model

An interesting piece from Dennis Howlett on how few analyst firms are blogging.

Bazaarz: Analysts reject blogs, screws business model

Why are YOU talking to the analysts

Don't talk to the analysts just because

a) it's what you have always done,
b) it's what everyone else does or
c) it's what everyone else says that you should do.

Every time you think about setting up an analyst briefing, ask yourself "why am I doing this?"

Then - knowing your purpose - you can ask "is this analyst the right person for me to be talking to? Is there someone out there who'd be more appropriate?"

It goes right back to basics but - hey - sometimes that can be a good thing!

PR-Guy makes the point in a far more entertaining style PR Squared: Skipping The Analyst Circuit

Echoes of the dotcom bubble

Google is now the world's biggest media company by stock market value.

From the BBC: "Google is now worth $80bn. This takes it ahead of media leviathan Time Warner, which is valued at $78bn. The valuation comes in spite of the fact that Google's annual sales total just $3.2bn, a fraction of Time Warner's $42bn.... (some financial analysts) maintain that Google's high stock value reflects its future earning potential and that its shares could go as high as $325-350."

People have short memories.

BBC NEWS | Business | $80bn Google takes top media spot

Tony Hart leaves Datamonitor

Tony Hart left Datamonitor today. He's going to join an enterprise search vendor called FAST Search and Transfer in "a consulting role."