Enterprise Content Management (ECM) is supposedly a very mature -- even old -- marketplace. However, there's still a lot of potential for expansion.

RSG's customer research has found that traditional file shares (a.k.a., F: and U: drives) remain pervasive. And likewise email. Many employees still use their email systems and file shares to store, manage, and share documents -- even within organizations that have already invested in ECM or DM tools.

This has ediscovery and findability implications. Content spread around willy-nilly in uncontrolled repositories can become a major issue during a lawsuit or compliance-related event. There are also storage implications, specifically when you use email to share documents because as emails are forwarded and sent to different people within your organization, the storage space multiplies.

All of this clearly shows that in spite of ECM being a mature marketplace, there is still a lot of latent potential for innovation. Indeed, I see some interesting happenings in the ECM marketplace. Our forthcoming marketplace analysis advisory briefing will examine the current state of the market as well as the likely evolution in the near term.

I'll look at recent vendor evolution (e.g., EMC divesting Syncplicity and then getting acquired by Dell), the impact of cloud and mobile on ECM and document management, and other key trends.

Meanwhile, you can check out our existing research or download a sample.