This IDC study (which is a translation of the Japanese report IDC #J9110105) defines the compliance infrastructure market and discusses its relationship with cloud computing. We have also provided an overview of major developments in the legal arena (as of end of June 2009) and presented compliance infrastructure spending in 2006–2008 and market forecast for 2009–2013 across the three functional markets of hardware (four product segments), software (12 product segments), and services (five product segments). In addition, we also forecast the Japan ediscovery solutions market.
"Cloud computing technologies that transcend national borders offer the advantages of convenience and lower costs. On the other hand, they may entail higher legal risks, such as increased complexity of ediscovery responses and the need to adjust among countries that adopt the principle of precedent and those that use statutory law. Compliance solutions will gain even more importance in the future. To global companies embroiled in international patent or intellectual property (IP) lawsuits, the development of information life-cycle management (ILM) systems based on centralized document management policies will not only support the U.S. ediscovery system in the short term but also strengthen intellectual assets management infrastructure in the medium-long term," says Eiji Sasahara, research manager, IT Spending, IDC Japan.