Baker Tilly analyses the main trends in the Information Services sector. But before we look at the trends in the sector, we explain what Information Services is. The global information services or "IS" industry employs integrated methods to gather, process, communicate and store different types of information to improve the efficiency of society and organisations. IS data, encompassing people, software, hardware and procedures, is used to study, analyse and improve decision-making processes.
New era of Information Services
In the new era in which we live, we are becoming more connected, we have a greater need to communicate and we share more information. Therefore, the emphasis is on new hardware and software installations that encourage greater automation, collaboration and storage in the coming years to help workers make the most of their time.
An economic slowdown due to COVID-19
The global information services market is expected to decline from USD 148.2 billion in 2019 to USD 144.7 billion in 2020, at a compound annual growth rate (CAGR) of -2.4%.
Solutions to archiving problems
While many providers want solutions to move their data from internal servers to remote servers, customers want complete solutions to eliminate the problems that arise from archiving. Therefore, many cloud service providers, such as Google and AWS, offer complete solutions for migrating customer data to the cloud.
Regular numbers in Information services
Sector performance in terms of earnings predictability is generally above average. On the other hand, Persistent Growth stock price ratings are more mixed, depending on each company's operating performance. But in most cases, investors who buy and hold stocks for the long term are likely to be satisfied with this sector.
New competitors
The latest market trend is the entry of new competitors, with stiffer competition. This is because the high capital barriers are not very high, which makes it a challenge to secure the best talent, given that the business environment and the position of companies can change rapidly when new players enter the field.