Migrated from eDJGroupInc.com. Author: Greg Buckles. Published: 2016-05-02 20:00:00Format, images and links may no longer function correctly.
At LTNY several providers asked me cryptic questions and dropped ‘rumors’ that kCura was going to ‘pull a Clearwell’ by undercutting their channel partners. Although I am now out of the market analyst biz, it taught me to always check the source when I smelled smoke. Sometimes you find a house on fire. Sometimes you find the BBQ party. The kCura team made all the right noises about their commitment to a healthy, happy channel and I don’t publish unsubstantiated rumors. At the kCura Spring Roadshow today, Andrew Sieja announced upcoming availability of RelativityOne, a SaaS version of the platform that was unveiled to partners at LTNY. The licensing options and details have yet to be disclosed, but I can see why any service provider who was already struggling with our quickly evolving market would get nervous when his customers could potentially host cases directly with kCura. What do I think:
I think that every eDiscovery service provider who derives the majority of their revenue from commoditized volume based processing and hosting fees needs to wake up and redefine their value proposition. The age of Software As A Service means that eDiscovery providers have to sell expertise, managers, support and other professional services instead of lumping them into $/GB charges. At my Ipro Innovations session, 20-30% of the crowd indicated that they were selling or consuming eDiscovery services under some kind of managed service, AFE or other fixed fee basis. Ipro’s channel partners did not express any angst to me over Ipro Cloud, their IaaS offering. kCura relies on their channel partners to provide case management and other professional services. They are not parachuting a 5 TB eDiscovery appliance into corporate data rooms and expecting customers to run it themselves. That’s what I think about this particular tempest in a teacup.
Greg Buckles wants your feedback, questions or project inquiries at Greg@eDJGroupInc.com. Contact him directly for a ‘Good Karma’ call. His active research topics include analytics, SMB eDiscovery, mobile device discovery, the discovery impact of the cloud, Microsoft’s Office 365/2013 eDiscovery Center and multi-matter discovery. Recent consulting engagements include managing preservation during enterprise migrations, legacy tape eliminations, retention enablement and many more.
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