Every product and technology solution provider inherently brings some amount of risk. When it comes to technology, change is inevitable and often a good thing, but also potentially a strong indicator of risk for new buyers of technology. For example:

• Vendors - of all sizes - can be bought and sold, merged, or shut down completely
• Employees get hired and fired - bringing new ideas and taking their ideas elsewhere
• Open source projects merge, fork, or stop innovating
• Products can be updated rapidly, occasionally, or not at all
• Updates can be minor, major, or complete overhauls

When purchasing new technology, you should always assess the risk of the product or project and vendor partner from which you are purchasing. We've redesigned our Cross-Check chart to make it even easier for you to make this risk assessment.

Ultimately you need to find a vendor that is a good fit for your needs in terms of usability, technical capability, and price. Beyond that, you need to assess the vendor itself, and consider where it's going. You also need to know about pending changes to any specific tool, which can have an enormous impact on your implementation.

For example, If a vendor is due to release a major upgrade to its product (and the product itself is a relatively small portion of the vendor's business), and at the same time the vendor is in acquisition negotiations, this would represent a high risk to you, the buyer. However, that's only a presumption; deeper investigation could reveal that the upgrade is a relatively smooth and productive one, and that the pending acquisition may in fact enhance both focus and R&D investment into this particular product.

Starting this week we'll be releasing new market analyses, complete with the new Cross-Checks in all of our technology areas. In each of these releases we'll explain what we're seeing in the market and why we place each vendor in a particular risk area. As always, there's no "magic" or "leading" segment.  You'll want to find the right fit for your needs. Our evaluations can help.

Subscribers, you will get the new Market Analyses included as part of your subscription.