E-mail archiving is catching on fast in Europe and if the Radicati Group's forecasts are correct, it is growing so rapidly that its size will grow tenfold during the next four years. That trend follows the same growth in regulation-driven message archiving phenomenon that's been part and parcel of messaging technology growth in the U.S.

Those conclusions are among those reached in a new report titled European Email Archiving Market just published this by Palo Alto, Calif-based research group. Some of the growing number of regulations are the same ones domestic U.S. companies are facing, primarily the Sarbanes-Oxley archiving requirements which are required of all European companies that have registration in U.S. markets. And there are movements afoot in the European Union to make their own copy of those regulations, something that has happened before as one Western Economy follow another in regulatory as well as (good or bad) business practices.

Besides the exported U.S. regulations, the study notes that Europeans are faced with the 1998 Data Protection Act, which is now under revision, The U.K. Combined Code, The U.K. Money Laundering Act, the Basel II Accord, which is also undergoing revision, and the Freedom of Information Act. All of these have some sort of archiving requirements, or at least requirements that make archiving an important thing for companies to consider.

Traditions Remain Important

The report says that more traditional incentives for companies to archive their e-mail messages are also in play in Europe, and are still the leading motivators for e-mail archiving. They include general backup and security concerns, legal concerns, enhanced customer service and knowledge management applications. However, compliance is where the growth is.

Traditional barriers have also prevailed, just as in the U.S., including IT resistance and a lack of understanding about what archiving can achieve for companies. But according to Radicati, the latter two have broken down considerably with the emergence of strong regulations, and the growing powers of business managers to control the activities of IT departments in Europe. The company's research indicates that the current motivations for e-mail archiving are arrayed as follows:

1. Storage - 41%
2. Compliance - 35%
3. Internal Requirements and Policies - 17%
4. Knowledge Management - 7%

E-mail archiving services and products are provided by a large number of vendors in Europe. Some of the larger ones include AXS/one, MDV Advanced Technologies, Zantaz, Mobius, KVS, IXOS, IBM, OpenText, iLumin, Cryoserver, Connected, EMC/Legato, Hewlett-Packard, and Merid. "The market is incredibly fragmented," said Sara Radicati during a conference call on European e-mail archiving. The report observed that during the last year records management and storage vendors have been actively moving into this market through technology partnerships or acquisitions of pure-play email archiving vendors.

The Elements Of Growth And Change

Radicati researchers said in the report, "We expect the market to grow as European companies increasingly realize the importance of effective e-mail archiving and become aware of its benefits." The study contains several predictions about that growth and how the market will consolidate, and change during the next four years:

• The European email archiving market is expected to grow from 78.1M Euros in 2004 to 851.8M Euros in 2008.
• Over the next four years, we expect to see healthy competition in this industry, and significant new product developments.
• In addition to email archiving requirements, there is also an increasing need to address archiving of instant messaging, and other equally important electronic records.
• We believe that in the next 12-18 months European companies will need to consider the regulations that apply to their businesses, and make a decision about the archiving functionality required in the context of a wider records management strategy.

For more information, go to www.radicati.com.