ServiceNow Enhances Share of ITSM Market
With ServiceNow last week announcing it had broken the US $1 billion annual revenues mark, it is clear that the hosted ITSM vendor is making great strides towards market domination. Indeed, the company now claims to have a 25% share of the Global 2000 organizations (ServiceNow claims 556 customers in this sector). It’s a growth that we are seeing reflected in Snow’s customer base.
Historically, the most popular of all our integrations was the ability to import inventory data from Microsoft’s SCCM / System Center solution (see here for a full list of other inventory sources we support). But since early 2015, the ITSM solution we’re asked to integrate with more than any other is ServiceNow. This is not only great news for ServiceNow (as I’ll explain in a moment), but a strong indicator that more and more organizations are realizing the benefits of having a close alignment between their ITSM and SAM programs.
Is ServiceNow set for global domination?
The ServiceNow financial report can be found in full from a number of different sources, so we will just focus on the key facts:
- Global Revenue is now above $1billion, an improvement of 47% from last year
- Was actually a fourth quarter loss of $37.4 million
- Net loss was $198.4 million
- Projects expected to grow at a 33%-36% clip, which equates to revenue topping $1.3 billion
Furthermore, ServiceNow are expecting to hire another 1,000 employees in 2016, a further sign of the impressive growth they are experiencing. A 47% increase in global revenue is a huge amount of growth, which Frank Slootman (President and CEO of ServiceNow) puts down to a ‘strong’ third and fourth quarter, and the “68% year-over-year increase in the total number of customers with annualized contract values in excess of $1 million, demonstrating that customers continue to expand their use of ServiceNow.”
Other enhancements that may have contributed include the recent ‘Knoweldge15’ event that saw over 9,000 people attend and the release of the CreateNow Developer program which helps to educate people in creating their own applications. However, a net loss of $198.4 million shows that ServiceNow is still burning a lot of cash in its quest for global domination. It still needs to consolidate its position and find ways to add further value to customers.
Why a specialist SAM solution is good for ServiceNow
The current relative states of ITSM and SAM maturity from a global perspective means that applications like ServiceNow are likely to be already in place within an organization. Therefore, when deciding on which SAM solution to implement it is important that you consider any connectors or integration abilities with incumbent technologies. This is especially important in the case of ITSM as, despite the advancements of both SAM and ITSM technologies, the common consensus is that there isn’t currently a solution that can perform both functions as well as a dedicated solution. In ServiceNow’s case, the fact is that ServiceNow has a relatively weak inventory capability when compared with specialist SAM technologies.
The ITSM solution is also not designed to manage complex licensing models or help organizations optimize (rather than merely report) on software licensing across the enterprise. Thankfully, this is where Snow and ServiceNow come together to provide an effective platform for managing software and licensing.
The benefits of ITSM / SAM alignment
Snow’s Data Exchange Connectors integrate the information provided by Snow License Manager into ITSM solutions like ServiceNow, giving service desk staff instant visibility into software installs, hardware configuration and usage metrics that can be used to quickly resolve cases and ensure the organization’s investment in software is driving business value.
Further, thanks to Snow’s unique Software Recognition Service, all the SAM intelligence presented in the ServiceNow interface has been fully cleansed and normalized, replacing raw data with meaningful information that can be actioned immediately. Through the availability of accurate and cleansed audit information, the Snow SAM platform helps manage new software deployments by providing the ability to validate whether or not the organization has enough licenses for the deployment of software. Furthermore, SAM technologies really inter-grain with ITSM life by supporting the change management process in the identification of unauthorized hardware and software, and also required upgrades.
Snow and ServiceNow relationship
Snow Software and ServiceNow have established a strong working relationship which has enabled us to build the sophisticated Data Exchange Connector between the two solutions. Snow License Manager has already been certified as an approved integration technology with the latest version of ServiceNow entitled ‘Geneva’.