Contact Center Recording Systems Market Expected to Grow 55 Percent by 2015

World demand for contact center recording systems reached $800 million in 2009, essentially unchanged from $795 million in 2007, according to a new report by Pelorus Associates. However, the global market is expected to increase 55 percent to $1.24 billion by 2015.

The report, authored by Pelorus principal Dick Bucci, notes that the contact center recording systems market went flat in 2008 after sever years of double-digit growth. The two major factors for the slowdown were a weak global economy and a dramatic decline in hardware revenues as vendors transitioned to more software-centric platforms.  

But despite sluggish activity during the past two years, the market is poised for exciting upsides for applications outside the contact center and for the continued rapid growth of analytics software, according to Bucci.

Some other highlights of the 123-page report include:

• The solutions suite model has been widely adopted by the industry. The report makes note of the fact that in 2006 only Witness Systems offered a workforce optimization (WFO) suite.  Now, 15 of the 27 vendors examined offer WFO suite solutions. However, only NICE Systems, Voice Print International (VPI), and Verint Systems (which acquired Witness Systems in 2007) provide all applications of the complete suite.  
• The merger and acquisition frenzy has cooled. 2010 saw three small deals—Verint’s acquisition of IONTAS, Enghouse’s acquisition of Telrex, and NICE’s acquisition of eGlue. Only one—Aspect’s acquisition of AIM Technologies—took place in 2009.   
• The bloom might be off the rose for outsourcing to low-cost nations in the Asian sub-continent. Major companies now understand that customer relations are too valuable to be entrusted to distant third parties. Sales growth in developing nations will become more dependent on the formation of contact centers to support domestic businesses.    
• The industry remains highly concentrated with the two leaders; NICE Systems and Verint Witness Actionable Solutions, accounting for 78 percent of the total market.

“The market is definitely expanding for interaction recording,” says  Bucci, who adds that the industry needs to do more to take advantage of other opportunities. “There are many applications for voice and data recordings, and it would be a shrewd move for companies to look into the enterprise for more uses,” he states. “And there is a strong argument for recording more beyond just the call center.”