Why IAM will be worth over $10 billion by 2018

Enterprises are increasing their investment in Identity and Access Management (IAM) solutions. According to research firm MarketsandMarkets, the IAM Market is expected to grow 15.1% over the five years from 2013 to 2018. IAM isn’t new, so what’s driving adoption?

As businesses migrate from Brick to Click their supporting operating models dramatically change. Limitations around opening hours and locations are quickly consigned to history. Every organization now has the opportunity to operate on a global stage, in a far more agile and dynamic environment than ever before.

As organizations continue to move their operations online the underpinning technology, and in particular how you govern people’s access to resources, plays an increasingly important role.

This world of opportunity is being embraced by everybody, from employee to consumer, however, it’s not without its challenges.

IAM as a business enabler

Traditionally businesses operating within a virtual environment have had two key objectives – to maintain a secure posture and achieve regulatory compliance. As the organization’s perimeter practically evaporates, the drive to implement IAM systems has grown.

The market for IAM solutions continues to develop with new and innovative technologies emerging. In tandem, so does the realization that IAM is not just a technology concerned with security and control. IAM solutions are being used to aid business agility – consolidating access and supporting collaboration, enabling new channels and anytime / anywhere access for everybody (across colleagues, partners and consumers).

The implementation of strategic Identity and Access Management platforms are also now a realistic vision for smaller organizations. A recent statement from MarketsandMarkets claimed, “The major force driving the IAM Market is the lowering proportion of services required for implementation of an IAM project (via- cloud IAM) as it was too heavy for Small- and Medium-sized Enterprises (SMEs) to afford traditional cost structure”.

According to research, SMEs across the globe will start investing more in IAM, as traditional cost structures erode and are replaced by more agile subscription and usage-based pricing.

Web based applications

The adoption of web based services continues at pace. The standards surrounding how to best collaborate between providers, and share information on identity and access rights, have also changed. Companies are looking for competitive advantage and partnerships that drive offerings which are quick to market and easy to consume.

However, this has implications for how you secure these services.

The need for a separate username and password for every service has come to an end. The only way to enable users to scale their consumption of services is to simplify how we handle credentials. What are the alternatives? There are concerted efforts to realign some IAM fundamentals, bringing with them a mandate that the foundation of next generation solutions will be built around core themes such as context, risk, privacy and trust.

For organizations embracing a wide range of audiences these changes reinforce the short-term need to adopt flexible, framework-based solutions that allow for the right combination of control and process to be adopted. Many of the pain points for identity are now moving from a technology realm in to the broader business.

'Technology only' views are out-dated

The IAM market is evolving. Demand is shaping new solutions, driving innovation and enabling new approaches to IAM. Tomorrow’s solutions need to recognize the person behind the access, and grant access that’s appropriate for the context of the transaction. From flexible, adaptive, access control to people-centric security there are several options that free the user from the historic, restrictive, shackles of traditional IAM.

The themes driving IAM today are more diverse and business focused. Companies are looking for agility and increased collaboration, service consolidation and improvements in customer experience.

Whether the driver is improved efficiency, cost control, expansion or improved governance – IAM plays a fundamental role in every business’ success.

Identity as a Service

IAM solutions in 2014 offer new approaches for organizations to meet business, rather than technology-aligned, outcomes. One of the most prominent changes we see today is the emergence of the Identity-as-a-Service (IDaaS) model.

Predominantly delivered as a cloud-based service, IDaaS provides new flexible and lower-cost routes to providing access to new services while still delivering the control, accountability and transparency that any IAM solution needs to provide. At an entry level IDaaS provides a quick route to 'single sign on’ for the cloud. Through extension, IDaaS services can manage on-premise infrastructures and will grow to cover an organization's Identity Governance and Administration (IGA) needs.

The real value of IDaaS services will be to act as a central point of integration, bringing together users and components across the enterprise and the cloud, brokering processes for provisioning and controlling user access to services wherever they may be delivered. With the right insight and planning the option to use IAM to underwrite significant and strategic business value is there to be realized.

Organizations around the globe are working tirelessly to facilitate the flexibility we demand from technology. It stands to reason that as we increasingly adapt to our virtual habits, IAM will play a pivotal role in both protecting the systems access and offering new ways to connect.