IBM Leads In Social Software

IBM announced that IDC ranked IBM number one in worldwide market share for social platform software for 2009 and 2010 by IDC.

According to IDC, the worldwide revenue for the social platforms software market was more than $500 million in 2010, representing growth of 31.9 percent. The market opportunity for social platforms is expected to grow by a factor of nearly two billion worldwide by 2014, according to the firm.

Today’s news marks the second consecutive year that IBM was named the market share leader and the second time that IDC published an analysis of worldwide social platforms software market.

The adoption of social networking in the workplace is on the rise.

According to IBM’s 2011 CIO Survey, 55 percent of CIOs plan to invest in collaboration and social networking to increase competitiveness over the next few years.

In addition, 77 percent of CIOs are looking to change their internal collaboration processes over the next three to five years.

Social platforms has emerged as one of the leading technology trends for organizations, based on the recognition that people – customers, employees, business partners, and suppliers – are looking for ways to more easily collaborate, interact and share data.

More than 35% of Fortune 100 companies have adopted IBM’s social software offerings.

IBM Connections Now Provides Real-Time Compliance

In related news, IBM also announced an expansion of its software portfolio to help organizations embrace the power of social business. IBM is now delivering IBM Connections, the industry’s first social networking platform with real-time compliance capabilities.

The new IBM Connections software allows organizations to track and trace data on the fly throughout their organizations. This information can be analyzed and is discoverable in real-time using the IBM Connections active compliance service versus waiting until day end for analysis.

The new IBM Connections 3.01 software uses microblogs, wikis, communities and activities to collaborate with clients, partners and employees.

The new features within IBM Connections also help foster greater participation in communities through moderation allowing managers and editors of online content to review materials before they are published, a critical step in compliance governance practices.

To help organizations take advantage of the social business opportunity, IBM Connections also features social analytics to help users find experts and the ability to comment or vote on ideas in a community.

“The benefits of social business are too great to ignore,” said Alistair Rennie, general manager, collaboration solutions, IBM. “With these new advancements around compliance enablement, a social business can confidently activate networks of people to use a variety of collaborative tools, to improve and accelerate innovation.”

The new software is part of IBM’s industry leading collaboration solutions portfolio.

You can learn more about IBM Connections social software here.