FAQ
We have been covering the sector since 2000 and closely watched it grow and evolve since its darkest days. To say the least we have seen a lot.
Our research is concentrated on the hosting and cloud infrastructure services market. Segments we study include managed hosting, dedicated hosting, virtual hosting, cloud infrastructure, shared hosting, domain names, SaaS and colocation. Our sweet spot is in the SMB to mid-tier parts of the market though we certainly don’t confine ourselves to these areas exclusively. We are global in scope with a special interest in emerging markets.
We opened our doors in October 2011.
Our ultimate goal is to bring a complete picture to the table. We want to be global in scope and speak to all sides of the story: from service provider down to the end user.
Great question. We specialize in competitive intelligence, insight and market trends. We try to stay on top of industry developments and distill that into content and feedback that “paints a picture” of where things have been, where they are and where they are going. We also create data sets that quantify and support our conclusions. If you are looking to get on to the radar of a CIO we probably are not the right place for you. In a nutshell we try to provide information and insight that helps organizations understand and navigate the marketplace and develop strategies to achieve business objectives.
Primarily hosting and cloud infrastructure service providers, technology vendors and financial institutions that invest, lend, advise, buy and sell assets in the sector.
Absolutely. Maintaining a certain degree of skepticism when reading any research is just like doing your due diligence. Its completely fair and recommended. But know that we are commited to being independent and balanced in our coverage. Hold us to our standards with feedback.
Fair question. Think of Structure Research as a much more cost-effective solution for your competitive intelligence, market research and strategy requirements. For a smaller firm Structure Research is a great alternative to hiring internally. If you are a larger firm working with Structure Research can be a very strong value-add to existing resources. Said differently, independent research groups provide unique perspective from a vantage point not easily attainable. Rackspace, for example, can’t call into SoftLayer’s PR department and get a brief about its new managed hosting line. Similarly, SoftLayer can’t call into Rackspace’s PR department and ask about how its new hybrid cloud product works. Structure Research - being an independent third party - can easily call into both PR departments, ask the relevant questions, put things in context and assess its impact. This is a cost-effective, efficient and reliable way to go about market research and strategy. And its available here at a fraction of the cost of doing it internally.
Various public disclosures are our primary source. However we do not rely on any single source of information (such as the press release) and make the extra effort to follow up with companies and gain depth, detail and added perspective. We also have strong relationships with companies across the sector and they are a very valuable source of information that is not readily available in the market.
No its most definitely not. We believe good research is about two things: added value in the form of detail and perspective and analysis of the impact. Structure Research strives and takes great pains to deliver this. We do not re-write press releases and analysis is not a few additional words that amount to not much more than a summation of the obvious. We follow-up and we try to get more. We spend time to place developments we write about in context and add insight. While there certainly is value in information aggregation we believe the key is the price. Larger research firms often charge for it but we are careful to be selective in what we charge for and what we make freely available. The entire sector has benefited from open source tools and we want to contribute as well. But don’t take our word for it. Read our research and you be the judge!
Twitter, Facebook and the web-enabled mobile device have effectively destroyed our attentions spans. The entire Internet population suffers from a severe case of ADD. People want their information fast and on-demand. Nobody reads anymore, they skim. They are not going to be reading long essays if the topic does not warrant it and they certainly are not interested in 50 or 60-page reports. Structure Research believes research, like all content, must adjust with the times. We make liberal use of bullet points, try to write shorter sentences and paragraphs and condense things down to the most important details. We write our research so that it is easier to skim or just read the key points and move on. For those that still do like more detailed commentary rather than snippets of information, do not worry, we will have that as well. But we believe delivering value through research means matching content publication with user habits. People want information fast and they want it now. They are not prepared to wait a few days. In using a blog format Structure Research will bring research-quality content to readers live. No more long waits. And the added value will be there as well … as it happens.
Our global scope and depth. There are other good industry analysts out there. We don’t pretend to have a monopoly. But few analysts have spoken with as many companies as we have and on a global scale. This gives us unique insight and perspective on the market and we plan to deliver that to our clients.
