Industry: Global Information Technology Data: Major Systems Integrators up till 2005. Data mined from Internet web sites and using the Vivisimo search engine
Treatment: The strength of the links determined partially by the hierarchical position of the identified alliance partner in the Vivisimo cluster results. Nodes are sized by degree centrality. Only the systems integration firms (green nodes) were surveyed for their alliance connections, hence they are the larger nodes as all other nodes have in-degrees only.
Commentary: The intent of the analysis was to understand the central role that systems integration firms play in the IT services market. One can see that the supply partners who have multiple links to systems integrators are located in the centre of the map. Looking at these companies, they were mostly considered high performing companies at the time and many still are. The inference is that if you are a supplier its probably a good idea to achieve a position of demand from the major systems integrators. An additional interpretation is that the major systems integrators are also exploring for that niche supplier that can provide them with that differential edge. A majority of suppliers therefore only have links to a single systems integrator. Many of these companies are small, niche or start-up companies.
