This past weekend we learned that Gigya will be acquired by SAP Hybris. California-based Gigya has been a top vendor in our CIAM Platforms Leadership Compass reports. Gigya offers a pure SaaS CIAM solution, and has one of the largest customer bases in the market. SAP’s Identity solution was previously positioned more as an IDaaS for SAP customers for SAP use cases.
What is most interesting is the pairing of Gigya with SAP Hybris. Hybris is SAP’s marketing tools, analytics, and automation suite. It already has a considerable customer base and big feature set. Gigya is also very strong in this area, with specialties for leveraging consumer data for personalization and more accurate targeted marketing.
This Gigya – SAP transaction is the latest in an active year of CIAM startups, funding rounds, buyouts, and even an IPO. CIAM is the fastest growing section of the Identity market, and all aforementioned activity is evidence that this trend is being recognized and rewarded by investors.
CIAM is an essential component in contemporary business architectures. Consider the following:
- EU GDPR – CIAM solutions collect and retain user consent for compliance
- EU PSD2 – CIAM solutions are significant competitive advantages for banks and financial services providers that implement them; CIAM can also offer strong customer authentication options
- Retail – consumers will shop elsewhere if the user experience is cumbersome
- Digital transformation – IoT and SmartHome gadgets are best managed via consumer identities with strong consumer security and privacy protections
Traditional IAM is also capturing a larger portion of most organizations’ budgets, as the C-Suite begins to understand the importance of cybersecurity and the pivotal function of digital identity within cybersecurity strategies. The lines between IDaaS and CIAM have begun to blur. Traditional IAM vendors have been modifying and rebranding their solutions to meet the changing needs of consumer identity. Some CIAM vendors are offering their services as IDaaS. If SAP chooses to leverage the full CIAM feature set that Gigya has, rather than just integrating the marketing analytics and automation capabilities with Hybris, it will broaden SAP’s reach in the CIAM and IDaaS space.
KuppingerCole will continue to monitor and research the dynamic CIAM market. If CIAM is a trending topic for you, join us at our Consumer Identity World events, in Paris (November 28-29) and Singapore (December 13-14)