Sterling Commerce has announced the results of a 2010 Vanson Bourne OmniBoss survey on strategies for business-to-business (B2B) integration. The survey polled 600 senior IT decision-makers at large organizations across the financial services, manufacturing, distribution, transportation and other commercial sectors in the United States, United Kingdom, France and Germany.

Many companies believe uncertainty in the B2B integration vendor market puts their businesses at risk. Forty-five percent of respondents say cuts in IT budgets are preventing them from finding a contingency in case of a change in their B2B vendor.

A large number of companies (41 percent) are aware of the uncertainty and instability in the B2B integration vendor landscape. Members of this group say this instability could affect their business.

Among responding companies who are aware of the instability, many are taking preventative measures: 84 percent are either rethinking or believe they should be rethinking their B2B integration strategy. Forty-one percent are rethinking their B2B integration strategy due to uncertainty in the B2B integration vendor landscape and 60 percent are actively considering changing their B2B integration vendor over the next year. Only 7 percent do not have any concerns about their B2B integration vendor.

In addition to offsetting vendor instability, companies are rethinking their B2B strategies because:

• Economic uncertainty has affected headcounts or budgets (60 percent)
• The need to reduce the cost of the way they do B2B integration (40 percent)

When asked what is the most important capability to them in a B2B vendor, 38 percent of companies cited financial stability.

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