Capgemini/HP Report Reveals Half Of Companies Inadequately Test Mobile Apps & Security

PRESS RELEASE

Paris, September 12 2013 – Capgemini, one of the world's foremost providers of consulting, technology and outsourcing services, and Sogeti, its local professional services division, today released the findings of the fifth World Quality Report1. The report, published in conjunction with HP, reveals that application Testing and Quality Assurance (QA) now accounts for almost a quarter of IT spend, as many organizations undergo the process of digital transformation and reliable software applications become increasingly critical to their operations and reputation.

As the importance of application quality increases, average spending on QA as a percentage of total IT budget has grown from 18% in 2012 to 23% in 2013. However, many organizations still struggle to demonstrate the true value of their testing function to the business. In addition, despite mobile being a primary channel of engagement for both employees and customers, almost half (45 percent) are still not adequately validating the functionality, performance and security of mobile applications and devices. Although the report highlights a rapid rise in mobile testing (from 31% in 2012 to 55% in 2013), over half of those surveyed (56 percent) cite a lack of specialized methods as the biggest barrier to mobile testing, and an additional 48% report that they still lack mobile testing experts.

With organizations increasingly reliant on IT systems and applications to support their core business functions without interruption, many are now taking a more strategic, centralized and business-led approach to QA. Compared to 8% in 2012, this year, over a quarter (26 percent) of those surveyed have consolidated their QA function across projects, lines of business or the whole company. Nearly one in five (19 percent) reported having a fully operational Testing Center of Excellence (TCOE) in place to serve the needs of the business, up from just 6% last year, as testing becomes a much more industrialized process within organizations. In addition, the report highlights growing demand for business and domain knowledge among testers, with nearly two thirds (63 percent) of executives surveyed saying that an understanding of the business is an important capability in their testers as QA functions seek to align more with strategic business priorities.

"The findings from this year's research have again highlighted the growing strategic importance of Testing and Quality Assurance, along with the critical contribution it makes to ensuring operational business targets are achieved and customer expectations are met," said Michel de Meijer, Leader Global Service Line Testing Capgemini & Sogeti. "Increasingly, technology applications provide the main interface between businesses and their customers - often delivered across multiple channels and devices, with end-users becoming less and less tolerant of functional errors, poor performance or known security vulnerabilities."

As QA continues to rise in strategic importance for many organizations, this year's study highlights how some businesses are pioneering the value QA brings to business as part of a more strategic approach, capturing metrics related to wider business ROI, such as the contribution of QA to reduced time to market (45 percent) or cost savings by preventing defects (39 percent). However, many organizations still do not demonstrate the business value of QA to the wider business, as they still mainly capture and report operational information such as the number of defects found (73 percent) or cost per test case (55 percent). Additionally, 45% of those surveyed are involving testing leads too late in the delivery process to influence application quality beyond just finding and fixing defects.

For those organizations struggling to improve the maturity of their in-house QA function, the outsourced Managed Testing Services (MTS) model is an emerging option, with 12% turning to MTS providers to bring not just labor, but specialized knowledge of testing processes and a full array of tools to test with maximum efficiency to demonstrate ROI effectively. For example, when it comes to outsourcing their mobile application testing, the capacity to test across a wide range of platforms and devices is rated as the most important capability (60 percent), reflecting the need to ensure coverage across a broad variety of environments which many internal QA functions cannot deliver.

"With the research findings showing that almost a quarter of IT budgets are now being allocated to Testing and QA activities, measuring the ROI to the business based on financial as well as IT operational metrics is becoming ever more important," said Matt Morgan, vice president, Product Marketing, Software, HP. "For organizations to take a more strategic approach to testing and QA, they need to have better visibility and reporting to illustrate both operational and business information value."

Additional Resources: Watch the HP webinar "Emerging Trends in Testing: Conclusions from the World Quality Report 2013-14" on October 2 at 1 p.m. ET.

About the World Quality Report 2013-14

The World Quality Report 2013-14 is the fifth in a series of surveys examining the state of application quality and testing practises across industries and geographies. Since 2009, the Capgemini Group and HP have published the report to provide insight into the latest trends in application quality, methodologies, tools, and processes. As in previous years, the report includes detailed profiles on the state of QA in a number of specific industries: Consumer Products, Retail, and Distribution; Energy and Utilities, Financial Services; Public Sector; and Telecommunications, Media, and Entertainment. The report also examines IT trends and quality practices from a regional perspective with separate sections covering: Australia and New Zealand; Benelux; Brazil; China; Eastern Europe (Czech Republic, Hungary and Poland); France; Germany; The Nordics (Sweden, Finland, Denmark and Norway); North America and the UK.

The World Quality Report 2013-14 is based on a total of 1,500 detailed telephone interviews across 25 countries undertaken with CIOs, VP of Applications, IT directors/managers and QA directors / managers within private companies, government and public sector organizations.. This data was augmented by in-depth client interviews, and then analysis and commentary carried out by our own testing specialists and subject matter experts. Like last year, this report focuses on the enterprise market only, namely organizations with 1,000 or more employees locally to their region. The key goal of this report is to examine the state of application quality and testing practices across different industries and geographies.

About Capgemini and Sogeti

With more than 125,000 people in 44 countries, Capgemini is one of the world's foremost providers of consulting, technology and outsourcing services. The Group reported 2012 global revenues of EUR 10.3 billion. Together with its clients, Capgemini creates and delivers business and technology solutions that fit their needs and drive the results they want. A deeply multicultural organization, Capgemini has developed its own way of working, the Collaborative Business Experience&trade and draws on Rightshore®, its worldwide delivery model.

Sogeti is a leading provider of technology and software testing, specializing in Application, Infrastructure and Engineering Services. Sogeti offers cutting-edge solutions around Testing, Business Intelligence & Analytics, Mobile, Cloud and Cyber Security. Sogeti brings together more than 20,000 professionals in 15 countries and has a strong local presence in over 100 locations in Europe, USA and India. Sogeti is a wholly-owned subsidiary of Cap Gemini S.A., listed on the Paris Stock Exchange

Together Capgemini and Sogeti have developed innovative, business-driven quality assurance (QA) and Testing services, combining best-in-class testing methodologies (TMap® and TPI®) to help organizations achieve their testing and QA goals. The Capgemini Group has created one of the largest dedicated testing practices in the world, with over 12,000 test professionals (as of June 2013) and a further 14,500 application specialists, notably through a common center of excellence with testing specialists developed in India.

Learn more about us at:

www.capgemini.com/testing

www.sogeti.com/testing