Worldwide and US discrete testing services market to experience solid growth as cloud and mobility drive next phase of evolution

FRAMINGHAM, USA: International Data Corp. (IDC) estimates that discrete or standalone global testing services spending reached $9.4 billion in 2010, with projections for worldwide growth estimated at a five-year CAGR of 15.4 percent through 2015.

New IDC research also shows that while the US has led other regions in adoption of discrete testing services, in terms of both traditional and newer cloud-based testing services models, there is an increase in regional interest and adoption of these services in Canada, Latin America, Western Europe, and parts of Asia/Pacific.

"The pressure to validate an increasingly complex set of testing requirements across different applications architectures and interfaces, multiple mobile OSs, form factors, and network technology layers is expected to tax most customers," according to Rona Shuchat, director of Application Outsourcing Services. "IDC expects that while internal IT or R&D engineering teams will increasingly look to leverage private and/or public cloud dev/test environments to improve efficiencies of operations, they will seek out third parties for their test resource expertise, test strategy planning, optimization skill sets, and automated integrated test frameworks to accelerate test cycles with greater test coverage at lower cost structures."

Additional key findings from IDC's discrete testing services market forecast include:

* The importance of software usability and the satisfaction of the end-user experience are projected to become more critical components influencing the adoption of testing services over the next few years.

* As smartphones and tablets redefine enterprise working methods and customer service approaches, the need to validate mobile applications for B2B, B2C, and B2E usage and performance is projected to build over the forecast period.