TBR’s Business Insights

Bad Debt Expenses Will Rise for CSPs in 2026

02.06.26

In a K-shaped economy that increasingly separates financial winners from losers, the majority of households and businesses on the lower arm of the “K” are under mounting financial strain and are finding it more difficult to pay their bills. As these economic pressures persist, communications service providers (CSPs) should expect bad debt expenses to continue rising, with the potential to meet, or even exceed, levels experienced during the Great Recession.

How Will Advanced AI Impact Pricing, Labor Practices and Client Expectations?

02.05.26

Advanced AI may be front and center in IT services strategy, but execution challenges remain a familiar story. Despite ongoing hype around unlocking new efficiencies and nonlinear growth, IT services firms continue to grapple with the reality of needing labor arbitrage in the short term and meeting client expectations.

Gustavo Quiroga Gaitan, Canva Pro

AI Alliances Will Increasingly Target OT

02.03.26

New and expanding partnerships are increasingly targeting the convergence of IT and OT, as system integrators (SIs) align with OEMs, manufacturing ISVs and silicon providers. This momentum is driven by the strong growth potential in high-tech manufacturing, where solutions that improve accuracy, efficiency and safety can be deployed on-site without reliance on rack-scale compute systems in neoclouds or Tier 1 clouds. As a result, while AI has long operated at the edge, these partnerships will accelerate both the sophistication of AI-driven use cases and the pace of solution framework development.

Agentic AI Adoption Is Pressuring Security Architectures to Converge

01.29.26

The emerging pattern of multicloud security consolidation has direct implications for both Amazon Web Services (AWS) and Microsoft, as enterprises reassess detection pipelines, governance models and operating frameworks heading into 2026. Although AWS remains well positioned in analytics-heavy workloads, the company needs to reevaluate its long-established “building block” approach, especially as peers deliver more integrated platforms. For Microsoft, its strengths will continue to be with organizations where Microsoft 365 already anchors their identity and collaboration strategies.

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The U.S. doesn’t have a Spectrum Shortage — It has a Utilization Problem

01.13.26

The mobile industry continues to beat the drum for more spectrum, but it should instead focus on fully utilizing the spectrum already allocated. TBR notes there are vast tranches of spectrum in the U.S. market that are broadly underutilized, either for technical or economic reasons. And challenges will only worsen as the industry aims to bring upper midband frequencies into the fray, which have greater propagation challenges and are less suited for macro coverage.

Shutdown Ends, but Federal Contractors Face a Slow Return to Normal

12.17.25

The 43-day U.S. federal government shutdown, the longest in history, came to a welcome end on Nov. 13, 2025, but for some federal systems integrators (FSIs), the shutdown’s impact could linger well into federal fiscal year 2026 (FFY26). According to the Professional Services Council, the national trade association for federal technology and professional services contractors, it will take three to five days for agency functions to return to normal for each day of the shutdown, implying that operations at some agencies may not return to normal until March 2026.

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Partnerships, Not Products, Will Define How Consultancies and Native AI Companies Share Value in Agentic AI Era

11.03.25

Just like supporting startup programs, many traditional IT services companies and consultancies have struggled to adequately put themselves in their alliance partners’ shoes. And when those partners are startups or immature native AI companies, that struggle will be harder in the absence of leadership, strategic direction and sustained investment. But that’s the potential downside. The upside is that consultancies are perfectly positioned to be change management specialists, helping their largest clients adopt the best new AI.

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Human Capital Management in the Age of (Agentic) AI

10.07.25

Fundamentally HR management remains a back-office function that IT services companies and consultancies can use to drive managed services engagements. And TBR’s research shows that managed services can lead to additional consulting opportunities, particularly when managed services providers (whether a traditional IT services company or consultancy) partners smartly with technology companies, leveraging the data and insights generated through back-office platforms to uncover issues and opportunities.

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GenAI Outcomes or Autonomous AI Architecture: Where Should CIOs Focus?

10.01.25

What good are AI-enabled solutions if an enterprise’s IT environment and architecture can’t handle the data orchestration demands and IT becomes a roadblock to faster, better, clearer insights from AI, rather than the business accelerator expected of IT departments in the AI era? After more than a decade of consultancies and IT services companies helping IT departments become business drivers, will inadequate architecture slow down AI adoption and AI agents at scale?

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SoftwareOne Acquires Beniva in ServiceNow Expansion Play

05.22.23/by Bozhidar Hristov, Principal Analyst

In a discussion with TBR, SoftwareOne’s regional vice president & transformation leader, explained that the acquisition of Beniva would help SoftwareOne move more expansively into the ServiceNow space, but in a manner that plays to two of SoftwareOne’s strengths: value-added software reselling and ITAM services.

What Is Driving Wireless Revenue Growth for U.S. Operators?

05.10.23/by Steve Vachon, Senior Analyst

Despite the relatively mature smartphone market, the majority of U.S. telecom operators were able to sustain year-to-year wireless revenue growth in 4Q22. Though inflation is limiting discretionary spending, operators are withstanding these pressures as wireless connectivity remains essential to most consumer and business customers. However, operators are being impacted by certain customers seeking lower-priced service plans to accommodate their tighter budgets, which is spurring operators to introduce new entry-level service plans, such as Verizon’s Welcome Unlimited plan.

Blog series: Gimme 3 Insight Interviews with TBR's Subject-matter Experts

Technology Business Research, Inc.

Why Federal IT Contractors and Commercial Tech Firms Need to Align

05.05.23/by TBR

In this month’s Gimme 3, Patrick chats with TBR Federal IT Services lead and Senior Analyst John Caucis on the U.S. federal IT operations and alliance activity of market newcomers Accenture, CGI and IBM

How Important Are Vendor Ecosystems in Network Services Deployment, and How Are They Evolving?

05.03.23/by TBR

For prime contractors, managing an ecosystem of subcontractors is a constant challenge. These challenges are prompting vendors to reevaluate their subcontractor ecosystem strategies, driving change in the makeup of subcontractor ecosystems as well as the approaches used to manage partners

Changes in MI/CI Observed by TBR

04.24.23/by TBR

The biggest change for CI/MI (competitive intelligence/market intelligence) in 2023 is the intensification of the “do more for less” mandate. Doing more for less has always been part and parcel of the CI/MI experience, but it’s particularly true in 2023.

Comcast Business Showcases Significant Progression Toward Becoming a Leading Global Provider of Secure Networking Solutions at 2023 Analyst Conference

04.13.23/by Steve Vachon, Senior Analyst

The 2023 Comcast Business Analyst Conference highlighted Comcast’s evolution from primarily serving local small businesses with traditional connectivity solutions during its infancy to its current ambition of competing as a leading global provider of secure networking solutions, supported by the Masergy acquisition and Comcast Business’ burgeoning enterprise business.

Technology Business Research, Inc.

What’s Next for Innovation and Transformation Centers?

04.03.23/by TBR

Learn how vendors are handling investments in innovation and transformation centers amid macroeconomic volatility and buyers reassessing their budget priorities

Top 10 Impacts for CI & MI Teams in 2023

03.30.23/by admin

In February of 2023 TBR surveyed its clean service teams on the state of competitive and market intelligence in 2023. One megatrend stood out in those results — change. In this blog post, we address the megatrend of change and dive into 10 subtopics that standout.

Challenges Facing Telecom Infrastructure Services Vendors

03.30.23/by admin

While the specific challenges differ by vendor, geography and/or TIS service line, TBR consistently hears about four major pain points that are broadly impacting most providers of telecom infrastructure services: wage and benefits inflation, worker and subcontractor shortages, navigating government incentives and stimulus, and ability to differentiate.

Where to Start with an Alliance Partnership

03.29.23/by Patrick Heffernan, Practice Manager and Principal Analyst

Alliance partner prospecting will start with requests from the stakeholders for more information about a specific vendor — a request, basically to understand, Who are those guys?

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