IDC, in its recent study has estimated that the majority of the U.S. finance and accounting (F&A) business process outsourcing (BPO) market opportunities have been claimed by a select few global services’ providers. The IDC competitive landscape study finds that even though market leadership positions are not yet set in stone, providers, such as IBM and Accenture, have successfully leveraged their global presence, vast offshore capabilities, technology assets, consulting expertise and BPO capabilities in adjacent business process areas such as procurement and HR.

The study provides the industry’s first comprehensive analysis of the competitive landscape within the rapidly evolving and vibrant U.S. F&A BPO market. The report identifies and analyzes the three broad categories of players vying for a share in this market – IT service providers, outsourcers and specialists dedicated to one or more segments of the F&A BPO market.

Observing the trends, the study states that acquisition of and partnering for highly specialized leading-point solutions around F&A processes; strategic deployment of the finance consulting expertise and technology innovation; aggressive expansion of global- sourcing capabilities, especially in Eastern Europe and India; and integrating F&A BPO expertise into comprehensive back-office solutions aligned with complete business processes are the subsequent vendor trends in the F&A BPO competitive landscape.