Ovum, now part of Omdia, was an independent analyst and consultancy firm headquartered in

London London is the capital and List of urban areas in the United Kingdom, largest city of England and the United Kingdom, with a population of just under 9 million. It stands on the River Thames in south-east England at the head of a estuary dow ...

, specializing in global coverage of

Telecommunication Telecommunication is the transmission of information by various types of technologies over wire, radio, optical, or other electromagnetic systems. It has its origin in the desire of humans for communication over a distance greater than that fe ...

Media Media may refer to: Communication * Media (communication), tools used to deliver information or data ** Advertising media, various media, content, buying and placement for advertising ** Broadcast media, communications delivered over mass e ...

and

Technology Technology is the application of knowledge to reach practical goals in a specifiable and Reproducibility, reproducible way. The word ''technology'' may also mean the product of such an endeavor. The use of technology is widely prevalent in me ...

History

Ovum was created in 1982 by Tim Johnson, a remote working technology journalist at ''

The Sunday Times ''The Sunday Times'' is a British newspaper whose circulation makes it the largest in Britain's quality press market category. It was founded in 1821 as ''The New Observer''. It is published by Times Newspapers Ltd, a subsidiary of News UK, w ...

'' in London. In 1985, Johnson was joined by four ex-colleagues from Logica (Ron Sasson, David Lewin, Richard Kee and Jules Hewett) and moved into its first office in central London. From this point, it grew rapidly in the telecoms and software sectors, enjoying 16 years of uninterrupted growth, and opening several offices around the world. Jules Hewett was Ovum’s longest serving Chief Executive, from 1988 to 1990 and from 1994 to 2001. In 2000, Ovum achieved revenues of £19 million, and made its first acquisition, Richard Holway Limited. Chris Dines, previously Finance Director, took over as Chief Executive in 2001. Ovum suffered during the tech crash of the early 2000s, but had recovered by the mid-2000s and was able to float on the London Stock Exchange’s AIM in March 2006 It was acquired by

Datamonitor Datamonitor is an international company providing market intelligence, data analysis, and opinion via a worldwide network of in-house analysts. The company tracks Automotive, Consumer Markets, Energy & Utilities, Financial Services, Logistics & E ...

in December 2006 for £42 million in cash before Datamonitor was itself acquired by Informa in 2007. Despite the company being acquired, the Ovum brand was maintained within the Informa Tech portfolio. The branding was finally withdrawn in February 2020 when Ovum, along with Heavy Reading,

IHS Markit IHS Markit Ltd was an information services provider that completed a merger with S&P Global in 2022. Headquartered in London, it was formed in 2016 with the merger of IHS Inc. and Markit Ltd. History IHS Information Handling Services (IHS) "wa ...

Technology and Tractica were rebranded as Omdia Ovum focused on analysing digital disruption in enterprise, consumer, and service provider infrastructure markets. It offered vertical market research in the following industries: Education, Financial markets, Government, Healthcare, Insurance, Payments, Retail, Retail banking and Utilities. The company was renowned for its business planning and strategy services through its databases tracking technologies adoption of fixed, mobile, TV and Internet services. It had customers in over 200 countries.

Coverage as media

The company has given positive reviews of: *

Scytl Scytl Election Technologies S.L.U. (also stylized SCYTL) is a Spanish provider of electronic voting systems and election technology. Founded in 2001 in Barcelona, its products and services are used in elections and referendums across the world. ...

in 2013

Coverage by media

Ovum analysts are frequently quoted in the media over various global channels when technology and telecoms news stories are reported.

References

External links

*http://ovum.com now redirects to https://omdia.tech.informa.com {{Informa Companies based in the City of London Research and analysis firms