Web conferencing spend to grow 24.3% in 2020

Spending on cloud-based web conferencing solutions is expected to grow by 24.3% globally and by 25% in Asia–Pacific this year as a result of the rapid adoption brought on by the COVID-19 pandemic.

Research firm Gartner predicts that the global market will surge to $4.1 billion in 2020, up from $3.3 billion in 2019.

While growth is projected to taper off in 2021, the growth adoption of cloud-based conferencing is expected to be more permanent. Gartner expects that by 2024, in-person meetings will account for just 25% of enterprise meetings — a drop from 60% prior to the pandemic.

“As a result of workers employing remote work practices in response to COVID-19 office closures, there will be some long-term shifts in conferencing solution usage patterns,” Gartner Senior Principal Analyst Megan Fernandez said.

“Policies established to enable remote work and experience gained with conferencing service usage during the outbreak is anticipated to have a lasting impact on collaboration adoption.”

But the overall unified communications market is projected to decline 2.7% in 2020 as new premises-based telephony investments decrease amid the rise in remote work, before returning to growth in 2021 as cloud telephony initiatives regain momentum.

“Cloud collaboration investments will buoy the UC market downturn as remote work initiatives spurred by the COVID-19 outbreak drive conferencing adoption and market growth,” Fernandez said.

“Cloud telephony adoption will experience a ‘push and pull’ from competing market pressures. Overall, the market will be negatively impacted by organisations that were planning near-term premises to cloud migrations but are now extending legacy life spans instead.”

The cloud telephony market segment is nevertheless projected to grow by 9% in 2020, but this compares to a projected 18% growth in 2021.

Image credit: ©stock.adobe.com/au/Andrey Popov