65 Percent of Webmethods Reference Customers Achieved a Positive Return on Investment According to Nucleus Research Study

Organizations considering webMethods integration platform need a clear project roadmap to achieve a positive ROI

Nucleus Research, the leading provider of bottom-line focused technology research, today announced the results of an independent study of webMethods (NASDAQ: WEBM), an enterprise integration software vendor. The study, published today and entitled, "The Real ROI from webMethods," concluded that sixty-five percent of webMethod's reference customers interviewed had achieved a positive ROI from their deployments, after an average deployment time of 2.6 years. An executive summary of the report is available at NucleusResearch.com.

For the newest report in Nucleus Research's "Real ROI" series, Nucleus analysts independently contacted webMethods customers without the vendor's knowledge to analyze the return on investment achieved by its customers. For this report, Nucleus conducted 20 in-depth interviews with customers who agreed to participate in the study, out of the 69 customers on the company's Web site profiled as reference users. Specifically, Nucleus examined the up-front and 3-year costs, the key benefits and challenges for customers, as well as the time for deployment.

Nucleus found that customers who had developed clear, long-term deployment roadmaps had the greatest success at achieving positive ROI.

"It's important for organizations undertaking enterprise integration projects to begin the process by clearly identifying a roadmap that identifies precisely what the implementation will accomplish, how much it will cost and how long it will take to complete. Without properly managing this process, achieving a positive ROI is impossible," said Rebecca Wettemann, vice president of research at Nucleus Research. "Enterprise software purchasing decisions should always start with an ROI assessment. This way they can ensure that they are buying solutions they need, rather than software they think they need."

Key Findings

Some of the key findings in the report included the following:

• 65% of webMethods customers achieved a positive ROI from their deployment.
• Benefits include development cost avoidance, reduced operations cost, improved customer transaction management, and improved partner transaction management.
• Best practices for achieving a positive ROI include reusing components, starting with a pilot project, verifying adapters, setting consulting constraints, and including knowledge transfer as part of any consulting agreement.
• The average 3-year cost of implementing and supporting the webMethods integration platform was $4.9 million for companies licensing the software and $3.6 million for organizations leasing it.
• The average consulting cost for deploying webMethods was $482,636 and the median was $150,000.

About Nucleus Research

Nucleus Research is an independent global research and advisory firm that provides CFOs and CIOs with the financial and technology insight they need to make clear, accurate assessments of the returns from their technology investment. The company is the first firm of its kind to blend financial analysis with comprehensive technology expertise to deliver 100% impartial return-on-investment (ROI) information to organizations worldwide. Nucleus Research uses an uncompromising set of processes and tools to evaluate the financial return on IT assets throughout a technology's life cycle, from selection and deployment to upgrade and retirement. Nucleus Research's ROI assessment methodology can be applied to virtually any technology investment. For more information, please visit NucleusResearch.com.