Gartner buys AMR

So, another analyst firm is to disappear. This time it's that leader in ERP and supply chain, AMR Research. It's being bought by Gartner for $64 million.

AMR seems to have got a fair price - 1.6 x sales is roughly the same ratio as Jupiter Research got from Forrester ($23 million paid on sales of $14 million) and more than Gartner paid for Meta ($162 million, 1.35 x sales of $122 million).

I'm not as upbeat as some other industry commentators are. AMR was a well respected firm with a good team of analysts. In its niche, AMR was a strong rival to Gartner.

Vendors and buyers looking for a second opinion on supply chain are now going to struggle to find a viable alternative in the short-term (although watch out for Datamonitor/Ovum, there's some really interesting stuff going on there - a compelling vision if it can be delivered on).

Given Forrester's focus on role-based research, you might have thought it would have taken a fancy to AMR. It'd be interesting to know if it got outbid by Gartner.

Because once word got out that AMR was up for sale, it's hard to see Gartner letting anyone else buy it. It's just too good a deal - revenue, clients, people and opportunities for growth.

Bruce Richardson, chief research officer at AMR, is eloquent in explaining why this also makes sense for AMR, over and above the hard cash that Gartner offered.

If you're interesting in reading more on this, it's worth checking out the IIAR blog post on the acquisition. There's some interesting and valuable insights there.