Kofax has increased its share of the global capture software and services market, according to a new report issued by Harvey Spencer Associates, an independent analyst and research firm.

The company claims it has maintained its dominant leadership position in the “Image Capture” segment and, for the first time, named the company as the leader in the “Transaction Capture” segment.

According to report, entitled “The 2010-11 Worldwide Market for Document Capture Software,” Kofax increased its overall share of the capture software and services market to 11 percent during 2009, an increase from 10 percent in the previous year.

Kofax customers in Australia and New Zealand include Allianz, SuperCheap Auto, Integral Energy, Salmat, HSBC, Flight Centre, NAB, ING, Suncorp, GE, bnz, University of Otago and NZ Ministry of Social development.

In the Image Capture segment, defined as scanning, indexing and then exporting document images and index data, the report cites Kofax as having a 25 percent market share, more than eight percentage points higher than its nearest competitor. In the Transaction Capture segment, defined as scanning, classifying, and extracting critical business data and then exporting document images and data to downstream business processes, the report names Kofax as the leader with almost a 13 percent market share. These two segments comprise the “enterprise” segments and account for more than 64 percent of the overall market.

Spending on Document Capture Software grew in 2009 by 2.1% to $US1.99Bm according to the study, which predicts the market will reach $US3B by 2013.

“Despite some very challenging economic conditions, the overall capture market grew as it changes and matures,” said Harvey Spencer, President, Harvey Spencer Associates, Inc.

“Although we track four different market segments, these can be encapsulated in two main areas:
Ad-Hoc Imaging and Batch Imaging – the conversion on-demand of individual documents or of like-type batched documents from paper into indexed images - declined by 1.9%. The major reduction was in Ad-Hoc capture, which declined by over 4%, whereas batch capture showed a small increase. This market was negatively affected by reductions in sales to consumers, in MFP sales, and in upgrades of small boxed solutions, and by the fact that much of the large batch backfile conversions in the developed countries have now been completed.
Ad-Hoc Transaction (in-process) and Batch Transaction - typically the capture and extraction of the data from paper and other document types - grew by 7.1% This market is driven by the need to understand and process incoming business documents faster and as close to the point of entry to the system as possible.

“Capture has evolved from a simple departmental scanning solution to intelligent data gathering,” said Harvey Spencer. “Large end users are realizing that many of the business transactions that enter the company in various ways, such as regular mail, fax and even email containing images, can be processed from the images. Previously these images have required expensive manual processing or have been ignored except for archive purposes.

“Using a variety of pattern recognition technologies, capture is starting to be employed to cover a much wider range of inputs. Intelligent classification software and business rules can start to process incoming business documents in a similar way to that of a trained human clerk. This expands capture into business process entry -- understanding and processing incoming electronic and paper documents, with little or no human intervention. This means that an entire transaction process can be automated regardless of whether it is received as an electronic transaction or as paper or fax.

“One example is Accounts Payable. Regardless of how the invoice is received, the process can be completely automated through Purchase Order reconciliation, to payment authorization and cutting the check or transferring funds. Records Management, and manual exception processing if required, can utilise image(s) of the document(s) that are automatically routed to ECM systems. Pattern recognition technologies can be applied to the many different types of documents a company receives, eliminating the need for sorting into document types or inserting (and removing) batch separation sheets.

“In 2009 we started to see a take-up in these types of Enterprise Capture solutions, which have a higher value add, and we continue to see more individual sales that are over $US200,000, and a few of several million dollars, as companies recognize compelling paybacks and ROI.”

Gordon Irons, Managing Director of Australia’s Leap IT Solutions, a procure to pay specialist, said “Organisations are increasingly looking at ways to reduce their cost base and the amount of paper and manual activities in their back office operations. Given the adoption of shared services by the public sector in Australia, many corporate organisations are now evaluating ways to improve or enhance their shared services operations.

“Some have already centralised and are looking to streamline and automate a range of paper-based processes such as accounts payable processing, mailroom automation, mortgage processing or insurance claims processing. Others are in the early stages of establishing a shared services environment.

“Based on our recent discussions with a range of corporates in the ANZ market, they are ready to adopt new technology that helps to improve the nature of and efficiency of their relationships with suppliers – in much the same way as they have invested in technology to improve their relationships with customers. This mindset is resulting in an increased demand for software that facilitates the information capture and business process automation requirements of these organisations.

“We see the ANZ market has now reached a level of awareness and comfort that these document and process automation solutions can deliver real benefits to their overall business performance. Initially the focus was more on information capture but organisations are increasingly focussed on initiatives designed to reduce the amount of paper used and thereby reduce their overall environmental impact.

“In Europe and North America there are more than 10,000 organisations who have selected and deployed these types of solutions. All these factors suggest the ANZ market will continue to grow strongly in the next 2-3 years,” said Irons.