Software Advisory Services

Threat modeling software has emerged as a distinct security category focused on identifying and mitigating design-level risks early in the software development lifecycle (SDLC). Unlike vulnerability scanners or runtime security controls that surface issues after deployment, threat modeling tools operate upstream, enabling organizations to analyze system architectures before code is written or released. For enterprise CIOs, CISOs and IT leaders balancing delivery velocity with risk exposure, this category supports a measurable shift-left security strategy grounded in design-time decision-making.

Requirements for sustainability reporting have been undergoing a political shift over the past year, including modifications to the EU’s reporting requirements. The difference between European and North American attitudes to sustainability as a priority, which were significant 15 years ago, began to converge toward the end of the ‘teens but now appear to be diverging. In the U.S. in particular, there have been legal challenges to state laws and a deregulatory emphasis at the Federal level. The scaling back of the scope and granularity of sustainability reporting is having its biggest impact on small and midsize establishments in the EU. Nonetheless, mandated reporting remains in place for larger enterprisers around the world, albeit to varying degrees. Moreover, there is still demand for enterprises to set and meet sustainability objectives to achieve increased operating efficiency and to associate their brand with responsible stewardship of the environment. For these enterprises, there remains the need to achieve efficient compliance with reporting mandates as well as to have processes and systems in place to set overall objectives and mechanisms to assign responsibility for meeting them across the enterprise.

Enterprise IT leaders face a dual mandate: maintain resilient operations while accelerating digital outcomes. AIOps software, where artificial intelligence and machine learning (AI/ML) models and automation converge across observability, incident response and IT service management, has moved from experimental pilots to foundational capabilities in today’s operations. As CIOs, CISOs and IT leaders look to balance business performance with technical rigor, AIOps offers measurable gains in reliability, velocity and cost control while laying the groundwork for GenAI-enabled workflows. This Analyst Perspective describes the benefits, pitfalls and practical steps for adopting AIOps at scale, with insights for both enterprise buyers and software provider product teams. For a deeper dive, see the 2025 ISG Buyers Guide for AIOps Executive Summary, available for download.

Over the past two years, I’ve led and operated as a practitioner in a sustained, feels-like-a-seven-day cadence to build what I believe is the most comprehensive enterprise software research foundation in the industry. Joining ISG after two decades of being a CEO and Chief Research Officer running a specialized research and advisory firm—Ventana Research—the new mandate was clear: expand software coverage more than 5x from 25 to 125+ categories and industrialize delivery through the ISG Buyers Guides, now accessible in concise, readable and listenable formats. That mission is complete: we’ve scaled operations across more than five consecutive quarters and expanded to a highly efficient global research engine that consistently delivers breadth, depth and enterprise-grade perspective.

In the U.S., enterprise service management (ESM) is increasingly seen as a strategic enabler of digital business, with a strong emphasis on integrating human-centered design, intelligent automation and digital strategy. This approach aims to transform ESM into the connective tissue of the modern enterprise that is adaptive, anticipatory and persistently value-driven. It has emerged from the shadow of ITSM and is increasingly recognized for its scope of functionality and strong value offered. The discipline helps enterprises speed up digital transformation from 2.0 (where they are and what they know) to 3.0 (where they aspire to be). ESM is driving this by enabling enterprises to bring traditional IT operations, disparate business services (such as CRM, inventory) and cross-functional services (HR, finance, facilities management and more) into a single, orchestrated service environment. Service providers have made impressive gains in this regard as they have notably improved their ESM architecture vision to enable business value. This mature approach to delivering business value has strengthened providers’ ability to engineer core elements that support continuous AI integration and support, multicloud execution and other features of modern systems. This fits well with how many U.S. enterprises are trying to transform their operations.