AV providers should intensify their focus on the corporate marketplace. That’s the
message from Futuresource Consulting as 24% of companies expect to add
additional meeting space over the next five years and ownership of corporate flat
panels is anticipated to rise by 25% and 17% in Europe and the USA respectively.
The findings come from a comprehensive end user research project carried out by
Futuresource across the UK, USA, Germany and France, comprising 500 telephone
interviews with AV purchase decision makers and 2,000 surveys of meeting room
users. The study provides detailed insights into the decision making process, the
now and next of meeting room tech requirements and AV purchasing behaviours.
“Corporate AV is suited, booted and ready for action. Our figures point to a total
addressable market of more than 10.5 million meeting rooms right now across
Western Europe and North America, and that figure just keeps on rising,” says Chris
McIntyre-Brown, Associate Director at Futuresource Consulting. “But the landscape
is changing, we’re seeing the rise of the huddle space and opportunities are opening
up in the SME segment. These are exciting times for the corporate AV market and
switched-on vendors could seize a significant slice of the action.”
Focusing on the display types in use, LCD flat panel continues to take share from
the projector market, and the shift is accelerating. By the end of 2018, European
respondents expect their ownership of projectors to have declined by 9.6%,
whereas they expect to increase their flat panel display ownership by 25%. Over
the same period in the USA, respondents expect their projector ownership to decline
by 8.4% and flat panel to rise by 17.1%. Of all the European markets, the UK
showed the lowest reliance on projection, although over 55% of large meeting
spaces and 45% of mid-size meeting rooms still have a projector installed.
Moving forward, web conferencing tools like Skype, join.me and GoToMeeting could
contribute to a greater range of opportunities opening up for providers of meeting
room tech. These platforms will become integrated into the meeting room
experience and demand will continue to increase for more collaborative
environments where both content and video need to be shared. In the US sample,
66% of respondents had a company sponsored web conferencing account, compared
with 44% in the European sample. From an industry perspective, the IT and energy
sectors show the highest rates of web conferencing adoption, with government and
healthcare organisations lagging behind the curve.
Crucially, when a meeting is taking place in their office, over 25% of the sample
stated that they would prefer to meet using web conferencing technology, with this
preference highest among large and mid-size organisations and professionals
working in IT, sales and marketing and C-level management.
For any additional data or information to support upcoming articles, please get in
touch with Nicola Finn via nicola.finn@futuresource-hq.com.
