Q&A Part Two: Ovum Talks About APM

Pete Goldin
APMdigest

In Part Two of APMdigest's exclusive interview, Michael Azoff, Principal Analyst at Ovum, talks about APM hot topics including Big Data, Cloud, SaaS, Mobile and DevOps.

Click here to start with Q&A Part One: Ovum Talks About APM

APM: Your APM Solution Guide promotes a “unified view” and states that “a comprehensive APM solution is essential.” Does this require one large solution that covers all APM capabilities?

MA: It is possible to get a unified view by choosing point solutions that together provide that unified view and some of those decisions may be driven by the different communities that are buying these solutions. Operations people are not really interested in source code level detail but developers obviously are. You are going to have these different solutions that are targeted at these different communities within the IT department. It is possible to have a set of point solutions that together cover the whole spectrum of performance issues.

APM: One point I see in your research, that we both agree on, is that Big Data is going to change APM. How do you see APM vendors addressing that challenge?

MA: Big Data was quite an eye-opener. You've got vendors like Netuitive and NEC that provide solutions that complement the traditional APM tools that do not provide the Big Data analytics. So you can buy an add-on tool. The big vendors are building their own solutions. And then you've got another bunch of vendors who are taking the complex event processing approach. So you have different ways of dealing with Big Data, but the vendors are addressing it. They are recognizing that there is a need for that.

APM: In terms of Software-as-a-Service (SaaS), your report states that some vendors are waiting to see how the market goes. What progress do you see?

MA: Some have SaaS APM products, some are building them, some products are half completed. I think in 2013 and 2014 you will see a lot more activity in this area. This is all being lead by the customers. It is reflecting enterprise moves to the cloud. We are seeing a greater shift towards use of Cloud services, greater confidence now, and the APM vendors have to cater to that need.

APM: I noticed in the Solution Guide you did not include the lack of SaaS as a weakness for any of the vendors. Does that mean you do not consider SaaS a market requirement today?

MA: We are at a turning point. If I was going to do this Solution Guide next year I probably would put SaaS down as essential.

APM: What is the level of maturity you are seeing in terms of monitoring applications across mobile devices?

MA: Mobile is an area that has become quite prominent very recently. We are seeing a shift towards the enterprise use of mobile devices, and with that the means to monitor the performance. I think the vendors are on top of that in providing capability for managing mobile apps. There are only two vendors in my Solution Guide that have absolutely nothing to offer – so that is a high proportion of vendors that provide this capability.

APM: How do you see DevOps impacting APM over the next year?

MA: DevOps is all about these two communities – developers and operations – collaborating, but they still have their individual needs which are quite separate. So from an APM perspective, vendors are clearly targeting their solutions at one community or another, or both in an integrated approach, but they are providing different information for these different communities. I think DevOps is a very forward thinking and necessary way of bringing down the silo walls.

APM: Do you have any predictions on how the APM market will change over the next year or so?

MA: I think the major waves – cloud, mobile, agile – have been initiated. I don't think we will see anything of the same magnitude in the next few years at least. I am not expecting something completely new, but I am expecting to see maturity in cloud and mobile, and consolidation of APM features.

Click here to read Q&A Part One: Ovum Talks About APM

ABOUT Michael Azoff

Michael Azoff (PhD, MIEEE) has been working as an IT industry analyst since 2003, bringing over 20 years of experience in pure and applied research and consulting in the IT industry. At Ovum he leads the software development and lifecycle management (SDLM) research and his current focus is on Agile practices in software development, including Application Performance Management, enterprise Agile transformation initiatives, DevOps, cloud related SDLM, rich Internet applications, and enterprise IT mobile development.

Related Links:

www.ovum.com

Ovum Solution Guide: Application Performance Management

Ovum Application Performance Management Market Overview

The Business Benefits of a Lifecycle Approach to Software Development

Michael Azoff's blog: Defining Modern Application Performance Management

Michael Azoff's blog: Application Performance Management and Data Overload

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Q&A Part Two: Ovum Talks About APM

Pete Goldin
APMdigest

In Part Two of APMdigest's exclusive interview, Michael Azoff, Principal Analyst at Ovum, talks about APM hot topics including Big Data, Cloud, SaaS, Mobile and DevOps.

Click here to start with Q&A Part One: Ovum Talks About APM

APM: Your APM Solution Guide promotes a “unified view” and states that “a comprehensive APM solution is essential.” Does this require one large solution that covers all APM capabilities?

MA: It is possible to get a unified view by choosing point solutions that together provide that unified view and some of those decisions may be driven by the different communities that are buying these solutions. Operations people are not really interested in source code level detail but developers obviously are. You are going to have these different solutions that are targeted at these different communities within the IT department. It is possible to have a set of point solutions that together cover the whole spectrum of performance issues.

APM: One point I see in your research, that we both agree on, is that Big Data is going to change APM. How do you see APM vendors addressing that challenge?

MA: Big Data was quite an eye-opener. You've got vendors like Netuitive and NEC that provide solutions that complement the traditional APM tools that do not provide the Big Data analytics. So you can buy an add-on tool. The big vendors are building their own solutions. And then you've got another bunch of vendors who are taking the complex event processing approach. So you have different ways of dealing with Big Data, but the vendors are addressing it. They are recognizing that there is a need for that.

APM: In terms of Software-as-a-Service (SaaS), your report states that some vendors are waiting to see how the market goes. What progress do you see?

MA: Some have SaaS APM products, some are building them, some products are half completed. I think in 2013 and 2014 you will see a lot more activity in this area. This is all being lead by the customers. It is reflecting enterprise moves to the cloud. We are seeing a greater shift towards use of Cloud services, greater confidence now, and the APM vendors have to cater to that need.

APM: I noticed in the Solution Guide you did not include the lack of SaaS as a weakness for any of the vendors. Does that mean you do not consider SaaS a market requirement today?

MA: We are at a turning point. If I was going to do this Solution Guide next year I probably would put SaaS down as essential.

APM: What is the level of maturity you are seeing in terms of monitoring applications across mobile devices?

MA: Mobile is an area that has become quite prominent very recently. We are seeing a shift towards the enterprise use of mobile devices, and with that the means to monitor the performance. I think the vendors are on top of that in providing capability for managing mobile apps. There are only two vendors in my Solution Guide that have absolutely nothing to offer – so that is a high proportion of vendors that provide this capability.

APM: How do you see DevOps impacting APM over the next year?

MA: DevOps is all about these two communities – developers and operations – collaborating, but they still have their individual needs which are quite separate. So from an APM perspective, vendors are clearly targeting their solutions at one community or another, or both in an integrated approach, but they are providing different information for these different communities. I think DevOps is a very forward thinking and necessary way of bringing down the silo walls.

APM: Do you have any predictions on how the APM market will change over the next year or so?

MA: I think the major waves – cloud, mobile, agile – have been initiated. I don't think we will see anything of the same magnitude in the next few years at least. I am not expecting something completely new, but I am expecting to see maturity in cloud and mobile, and consolidation of APM features.

Click here to read Q&A Part One: Ovum Talks About APM

ABOUT Michael Azoff

Michael Azoff (PhD, MIEEE) has been working as an IT industry analyst since 2003, bringing over 20 years of experience in pure and applied research and consulting in the IT industry. At Ovum he leads the software development and lifecycle management (SDLM) research and his current focus is on Agile practices in software development, including Application Performance Management, enterprise Agile transformation initiatives, DevOps, cloud related SDLM, rich Internet applications, and enterprise IT mobile development.

Related Links:

www.ovum.com

Ovum Solution Guide: Application Performance Management

Ovum Application Performance Management Market Overview

The Business Benefits of a Lifecycle Approach to Software Development

Michael Azoff's blog: Defining Modern Application Performance Management

Michael Azoff's blog: Application Performance Management and Data Overload

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The gap is widening between what teams spend on observability tools and the value they receive amid surging data volumes and budget pressures, according to The Breaking Point for Observability Leaders, a report from Imply ...

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Seamless shopping is a basic demand of today's boundaryless consumer — one with little patience for friction, limited tolerance for disconnected experiences and minimal hesitation in switching brands. Customers expect intuitive, highly personalized experiences and the ability to move effortlessly across physical and digital channels within the same journey. Failure to deliver can cost dearly ...

IT's Motivation Crisis Is Really a Process Crisis

If your best engineers spend their days sorting tickets and resetting access, you are wasting talent. New global data shows that employees in the IT sector rank among the least motivated across industries. They're under a lot of pressure from many angles. Pressure to upskill and uncertainty around what agentic AI means for job security is creating anxiety. Meanwhile, these roles often function like an on-call job and require many repetitive tasks ...

AI Now Interacts With Production Databases in 96.5% of Organizations as Governance Automation Lags

In a 2026 survey conducted by Liquibase, the research found that 96.5% of organizations reported at least one AI or LLM interaction with their production databases, often through analytics and reporting, training pipelines, internal copilots, and AI generated SQL. Only a small fraction reported no interaction at all. That means the database is no longer a downstream system that AI "might" reach later. AI is already there ...

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In many organizations, IT still operates as a reactive service provider. Systems are managed through fragmented tools, teams focus heavily on operational metrics, and business leaders often see IT as a necessary cost center rather than a strategic partner. Even well-run ITIL environments can struggle to bridge the gap between operational excellence and business impact. This is where the concept of ITIL+ comes in ...

UK Organizations Hit Observability Breaking Point

UK IT leaders are reaching a critical inflection point in how they manage observability, according to research from LogicMonitor. As infrastructure complexity grows and AI adoption accelerates, fragmented monitoring environments are driving organizations to rethink their operational strategies and consolidate tools ...

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For years, many infrastructure teams treated the edge as a deployment variation. It was seen as the same cloud model, only stretched outward: more devices, more gateways, more locations and a little more latency. That assumption is proving costly. The edge is not just another place to run workloads. It is a fundamentally different operating condition ...

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