Two weeks in a row cranking out tons of analysis around technology companies, their strategies and performances, and how we see the market changing constantly. As always, connect directly with the analysts if you have questions.

Monday

• In TBR’s 1Q19 Fujitsu Cloud Initial Response, we discuss Fujitsu’s strategy and next moves after its decision last October to stop international sales of K5. An increasingly strategic partnership with Microsoft coupled with continued enhancements to its data center and managed services businesses and capabilities will be ever more critical to the vendor’s long-term success outside Japan. — Cassandra Mooshian, Senior Analyst, Cloud and Software Team

Tuesday

• In TBR’s 1Q19 Alphabet (Google) Initial Response, we track Alphabet’s ability to supplement core advertising revenue with sales of its Hardware products, Cloud services and YouTube subscriptions, as well as its investments in original and licensed video content that have begun to pressure margins. Alphabet’s Other Bets also comes into focus as the company leverages investments in the businesses within this segment, such as Waymo autonomous driving, Verily life sciences and Wing drone delivery, to create revenue streams that are sustainable over the long term. — Michael Soper, Senior Analyst, Telecom Team

• Leidos begins 2019 with a renewed focus on growth and continued robust activity within its public sector healthcare business. TBR’s 1Q19 Leidos Initial Response will highlight two new collaborations to illustrate the increasing strategic importance of healthcare in Leidos’ revamped growth strategy, as well as updates on the company’s ongoing consolidation of its physical assets in the U.S. and expansion of its footprint in the U.K. — John Caucis, Senior Analyst, Professional Services Team

• Digital marketing services (DMS) remains a growth opportunity — expected to reach $132 billion by 2023 — as CX-related content deployment advances to maturity. In TBR’s 2Q19 Digital Transformation Insights Report: DMS, TBR benchmarks 19 vendors that are well positioned to increase their share of the addressable DMS market, which on average expanded in revenue 22% year-to-year in 4Q18, through 2023.— Boz Hristov,Senior Analyst, Professional Services Team

Wednesday

• In TBR’s 1Q19 Apple Initial Response, we will report on Apple’s efforts to shift toward a more services-oriented model as it combats slower product revenue due to lengthening smartphone ownership cycles and global saturation. While Apple’s extensive ecosystem puts it into a strong position to enter the vast content services ecosystem, the company will have to navigate busy service and content markets and overcome experienced and embedded competitors, such as Netflix, Amazon and Spotify. — Daniel Callahan, Analyst, Devices and IoT Team 

Thursday

• With nearly $1 billion in new acquisitions in 1Q19, M&A is once again taking center stage in CACI’s overall growth strategy, enabling the company to align well with shifting defense and intelligence priorities emphasizing agile solution development, accelerated acquisitions cycles, and advanced communications and security products for warfighting and intelligence missions.  TBR will have in-depth analysis of CACI’s most recent acquisitions to expand its portfolio of cyber, electronic warfare and communications intelligence capabilities in our 1Q19 CACI Initial Response. — John Caucis, Senior Analyst, Professional Services Team

Friday

• Cognizant’s strategic framework is in place, enabling the company to capture and accelerate digital opportunities. The recent acquisition of Meritsoft, which will add SaaS capabilities to its Digital Operations arsenal, reaffirms Cognizant’s commitment to digital and will help the company expand its digital platforms within its addressable market. — Kelly Lesiczka, Analyst, Professional Services Team 

• Steady expansion of the number of clients in Tata Consultancy Services’ (TCS) largest segments illustrates the continued traction of TCS’ Business 4.0 framework, designed to drive digital enablement. TBR’s 1Q19 TCS report will discuss hiring trends and margin projections during the remainder of 2019. — Kevin Collupy, Analyst, Professional Services Team

• As Infosys evolves its value proposition and go-to-market strategy, investments in AI, cloud and design thinking remain at the forefront of company executives’ agenda. A recent uptick in performance, evidenced by the healthy pipeline of large deals the company signed in FY19 for a total contract value of $6.28 billion, gives Infosys the confidence to invest and tout capabilities in new areas to secure long-term growth through product-enabled services. Doubling down on its position on the services supply side through investments in innovative portfolio offerings could help Infosys solidify its standing as a trusted outsourcer as it converts bookings to cash.
• — Boz Hristov, Senior Analyst, Professional Services Team

This week TBR will also publish several special reports on recent analyst events, including PwC’s Risk Summit and EY’s annual analyst event.

This week is one of the busiest weeks of the year for us, with plenty of earnings calls and scheduled benchmark publications.

Tuesday

• TBR’s Cloud Professional Services Benchmark highlights the leading vendors — and strategies — in each cloud professional services market as well as how evolving customer demands are fundamentally disruptive to the market as a whole. Enterprises are increasingly looking for vendors to supplement labor-intensive activities with automation to speed time to delivery and keep costs at bay, forcing vendors to establish more repeatable software and delivery frameworks. While Accenture and IBM continue to lead the market, regional systems integrators and cloud vendors themselves continue to build their solution sets, aiming to close the gap the two leaders have on the market. — Senior Analyst Cassandra Mooshian
• Under new CEO Hans Vestberg, Verizon is streamlining its operations and go-to-market strategies to highlight its strengths as a provider of premium network services. Verizon’s renewed focus on core services follows prior attempts to create growth engines via ventures such as Oath and go90, which ultimately fell short of expectations. TBR’s 1Q19 Verizon Initial Response will examine how Verizon’s restructuring strategies are impacting the company’s profitability and will include assessment on the operator’s early 5G initiatives. — Analyst Steve Vachon

Wednesday

• Market challenges and shifting consumer preferences are impacting investments AT&T has been relying on to sustain long-term revenue growth. For instance, DIRECTV continues to shed satellite customers and struggles to retain DIRECTV NOW subscribers amid the multitude of other over-the-top services in the market. WarnerMedia and Xandr will serve as new growth engines but will face market challenges as WarnerMedia’s streaming service competes against rival offerings such as Netflix and Disney+ and Xandr is challenged by the duopoly of Facebook and Google in the digital advertising market. In TBR’s 1Q19 AT&T Initial Response, we will analyze how AT&T’s WarnerMedia and DIRECTV initiatives are impacting the company’s overall financial performance and assess the operator’s growth initiatives in areas including 5G, IoT and NFV/SDN. — Steve Vachon

Thursday

• To drive cloud revenue growth in the next two years, Accenture’s Cloud practice will rely on its business-centric approach and ability to provide multicloud managed services. At the same time proper pricing scope and staff management are must-haves for Accenture to remain competitive. — Senior Analyst Boz Hristov
• Industry specialization is becoming a central focus of Atos’ strategy as the company articulates and delivers digital value and customer excellence leveraging its technology expertise and partnerships in areas such as security, cloud, IoT and quantum computing. One of Atos’ strengths, which TBR will highlight in this quarter’s initial response, is its ability to strictly execute on the plans it sets for its financial performance over three-year horizons and present consistent messaging to the industry analyst community. — Senior Analyst Elitsa Bakalova
• TBR expects Capgemini will sustain revenue growth through dynamic portfolio management while further improving profitability during 2019. Capgemini is positioning as a leading IT services vendor for clients facing mission-critical challenges. Capgemini helps clients reach their business goals by deepening industry specialization, approaching clients’ C-Suites and selling solutions across the portfolio. — Elitsa Bakalova
• In TBR’s semiannual Global Delivery Benchmark, we report that to sustain revenue growth, vendors have been transitioning from human capital-focused to technology-enabled organizations. However, vendors increasingly struggle to balance navigating the automation-enabled services market with meeting stakeholders’ expectations, forced to use labor arbitrage again. — Boz Hristov

Friday

• Digging into Atos’ Cloud practice, TBR notes that Atos seems to have solidified its cloud strategy and doubled down on its cloud go-to-market efforts over the past year, particularly benefiting from its partnership with Google Cloud and the Syntel acquisition in North America as well as opportunities to capitalize on bringing its cloud solutions and capabilities to Syntel’s customer base in the region, which is underpenetrated by Atos. The challenge, however, will be for Atos to establish, build and maintain brand awareness in North America, particularly as the region is arguably the most saturated cloud market globally.
• We reported in 4Q18 that Fujitsu Services continued to rely on its Japan client base as a primary driver of revenue expansion. TBR expects the same will be true in 1Q19 as Fujitsu reorients its talent in Europe, impacting its sales strategy and access to clients outside of primary focus areas in onshore Europe. While the shift will improve Fujitsu’s marketing and sales efforts in onshore EMEA, Fujitsu Services revenue could face challenges from the losses in offshore areas.

This week TBR will also publish 1Q19 initial responses on public sector-focused and healthcare IT services-centric vendors. Our senior analyst in these areas summed up developments in both as follows:

• Recent and ongoing actions by benchmarked public sector vendors (e.g., Northrop Grumman, General Dynamics) illustrate the priority equivalence of portfolio reshaping, enhancing operational efficiencies, and optimizing supply and service delivery chains to maintain growth and competitiveness in an evolving government IT investment environment. Some providers are allowing low-value contracts on their books to expire without replacement to reposition their business mix upmarket and away from increasingly commoditized technology areas. Despite the turmoil generated by the 35-day partial government shutdown, federal IT vendors saw their primary customer beginning fiscal year 2019 with a budget for the Department of Defense (DOD) in place and, for the first time in a decade, without a continuing resolution. The enhanced stability and predictability of the DOD spending environment is buoying the outlook for defense-focused contractors across the board and generating confidence about 2019.
• Healthcare IT services (HITS) vendors are finding increasing difficulty scaling revenues from existing provider clients simply on the coattails of prior health IT investments. Not only have health systems adopted a more judicious approach to their IT budgeting, but the burden is also increasing on health IT vendors to deliver maximum ROI with every engagement. Pockets of growth exist and new ones are emerging, even as the overall trend in health IT spend moderates. Average contract sizes are slowly expanding for several health IT vendors, particularly the electronic health record (EHR)-centric companies that are seeing more frequent services expansions with existing clients. The diversification of health IT contracts is also forcing vendors to streamline go-to-market approaches for selling wide-ranging solution categories and simplify the process for existing clients to work with them. The maturity of the U.S. EHR market (industry observers estimate 95% of hospitals and 87% of physician practices now have some kind of EHR system in place) is also pressuring HITS vendors to increase R&D to develop new solutions geared toward the impending industry adoption of value-based care and fee-for-value models of care remuneration and delivery.