Gartner Special Report

Top Trends for

Tech Providers
for 2023

Rajesh Kandaswamy, Annette Jump, Anshul Gupta,

Arthur Villa, Adam Woodyer, Emil Berthelsen, Katie Camilli,
Esha Bhatia, Ephraim Baron, Christy Ferguson

4 January 2023
Top Trends for Tech Providers for 2023
Published 4 January 2023 - ID G00779442 - 6 min read
By Analyst(s): Rajesh Kandaswamy, Annette Jump, Anshul Gupta, Arthur Villa, Adam
Woodyer, Emil Berthelsen, Katie Camilli, Esha Bhatia, Ephraim Baron, Christy Ferguson
Initiatives: Emerging Technologies and Trends Impact on Products and Services

New trends such as product-led growth, federated tech buying and

marketing using metaverse tech will deeply impact tech providers
alongside previous trends such as intelligent applications and tech
democratization. Product leaders must plan for these trends to
succeed in 2023 and beyond.

Analysis
The world has changed dramatically since Gartner launched its first annual top trends for
2022. The recovery from the pandemic continues, but Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, high
inflation and supply chain issues have tormented the world economy. While these large
forces will leave a marked impression on the technology industry, the onward march of
digital technology in the economy and society continues, with technology providers
playing a leading role.

In 2023, product leaders and other executives must balance both short-term planning with
long-term strategy to stay ahead of the immediate shocks to the economy and the
underlying forces shaping their business. Gartner’s top trends for 2023 reflect this dual
reality. The trends are the effects of three broad themes and are grouped below. (Five of
these trends were present in the 2022 edition and have been selected again due to their
growing prominence and scale. They are marked with * in the lists below.)

Increased Reliance on Tech

These trends have emerged due to businesses increasing their reliance on tech across all
aspects of business and operating models:

■ Federated enterprise tech buying — Acceleration of federated buying, which adds

complexity and opportunities for product leaders while forcing changes to long-
standing go-to-market models

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■ Co-innovation ecosystems* — New value creation through collaboration and co-
creation

■ Democratization of tech* — Expansion of digital responsibility and capability for

tech beyond IT

■ Product-led growth: Driving growth by creating advocates that experience product

value, and augmenting automation with marketing and sales resources.

Opportunities Through New Tech

These trends have emerged primarily through the use of new technologies or established
technologies in new ways:

■ Rise of digital marketplaces — Use of marketplace mechanisms in tech sales,

delivery and support

■ Intelligent applications* — Shift to a new paradigm of intelligent computing from a

procedural one

■ Utilizing metaverse technologies for marketing and CX — Growing use of metaverse

technologies to create unique experiences, impactful interactions and novel
engagement

Impact of Macro Forces

These trends have emerged due to powerful external forces, including macroeconomic,
sociological and environmental factors:

■ Sustainable business* — Elevated importance of environmental, social and

governance factors on corporate, business and product-level decision making

■ Techno-nationalism* — Diverging technology stacks driven by local regulations that

force realignment of ecosystems and supply chains

Figure 1 provides an overview.

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Figure 1: Top Trends for Tech Providers in 2023

These 10 trends:

■ Will impact many areas, including customers, buyers, products, ecosystems,

business models and operating models

■ Require decisions to be made by product leaders and executives

■ Are evident now and relevant for the next three years

■ Have worldwide implications

■ Will impact most tech provider products and services

■ Will impact multiple vertical industries

See Note 1 for the methodology that we used to select these trends.

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Product leaders must evaluate the impact of these trends across all dimensions of their
business to determine required actions. It is vital that product leaders engage with other
strategic leaders in their organization across finance, marketing, sales, operations and
other areas to craft their strategies.

Table 1 highlights the trends and the level of impact across various dimensions of tech
provider business.

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Table 1: Impact Level of 2023 Trends
(Enlarged table in Appendix)

Research Highlights
Links to the research notes that analyze the top 10 trends for tech providers in 2023 are
listed below. The order in the list does not imply a ranking.

Gartner, Inc. | G00779442 Page 5 of 8

Top Tech Provider Trend for 2023: Sustainable Business

A successful transition to net zero and a circular economy is driven by a mix of top-down
and bottom-up practices, underpinned by technology innovations. Product leaders must
improve the sustainability of their products that become an enabling technology for
sustainable business outcomes for their users.

Top Tech Provider Trend for 2023: Techno-nationalism

A sharp increase in mercantilist politics, nationalization and protectionism is impacting

global technology ecosystems. Techno-nationalism supersedes globalization. Product
leaders must balance meeting specific country-level localization and product profitability.

Top Tech Provider Trend for 2023: Federated Enterprise Tech Buying

Product leaders must adjust to a federated buying process, where authorized decision
makers and influencers are increasingly outside IT. This shift demands revised go-to-
market models, with a greater focus on value scenarios and outcomes than on the
technology.

Top Tech Provider Trend for 2023: Co-innovation Ecosystems

Businesses are actively using technology to differentiate and succeed, so they are
increasingly co-innovating with tech providers. Product leaders must take a strategic high-
priority approach to co-innovation to deliver customer value, balance investment, and
control and speed of innovation.

Top Tech Provider Trend for 2023: The Democratization of Technology

The democratization of technology empowers non-IT workers to seek out, select,

implement and custom fit their own technology. Product leaders must embrace the new
opportunities this trend offers and meet the needs of a new set of citizen developers and
business technologists.

Top Tech Provider Trend for 2023: Product-Led Growth

Building on the hype, promise and successes related to product-led growth, B2B product
leaders must address user versus buyer influence and dynamics as well as how to
manage, prioritize and/or interweave PLG (if suitable to their products) and sales-led
growth motions for go-to-market success.

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Top Tech Provider Trend for 2023: Rise of Digital Marketplaces

Tech buyers are embracing digital marketplaces to easily find, procure, implement and
integrate technology solutions. Product leaders must capitalize on this trend to connect
and find new buyers through digital marketplaces and to shorten the buying cycle.

Top Tech Provider Trend for 2023: Intelligent Applications

Intelligent applications will create value and disrupt markets by learning, adapting, and
generating new ideas and outcomes. Product leaders must focus on implementing
intelligent capabilities to compete against the coming wave of emerging offerings.

Top Tech Provider Trend for 2023: Utilizing Metaverse Technologies for Marketing and CX

Metaverse technologies are rapidly gaining traction in areas of marketing for creating
unique experiences, impactful interactions and novel engagement. Product leaders must
seize the opportunities now available to create unique experiences and elevate their
marketing and CX initiatives.

Additional research contribution and review: Esha Bhatia

Note 1: Methodology
Gartner’s selection of the top trends is based on primary research activities, including
surveys, external sources and interactions with tech providers, enterprises and other
organizations. The selection was made from a larger collection of more than 80 trends
identified, curated and synthesized by our research teams, qualifying top trends with such
criteria as scope, breath and time of impact.

Document Revision History

Top Trends for Tech Providers for 2022 - 16 February 2022

Gartner, Inc. | G00779442 Page 7 of 8

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Gartner, Inc. | G00779442 Page 8 of 8

Table 1: Impact Level of 2023 Trends

Products and Customers Operations Competitive Partners and Talent and

Services and Buyers and Processes Landscape Ecosystems Resources

Sustainable ⬤Very high ⬤High ⬤Medium ⬤High ⬤Very high ⬤High

Business

Techno-nationalism ⬤High ⬤Medium ⬤Medium ⬤High ⬤Very high ⬤Low

Federated Enterprise ⬤High ⬤Very high ⬤Medium ⬤Very high ⬤High ⬤High
Tech Buying

Co-innovation ⬤Very high ⬤High ⬤Medium ⬤Medium ⬤Very high ⬤Medium

Ecosystems

Democratization of ⬤Very high ⬤Very high ⬤Medium ⬤Very high ⬤Very high ⬤High
Tech

Product-Led Growth ⬤Very high ⬤Very high ⬤Very high ⬤High ⬤Medium ⬤Medium

Rise of Digital ⬤Very high ⬤Very high ⬤High ⬤Very high ⬤Medium ⬤High
Marketplaces

Intelligent ⬤Very high ⬤Very high ⬤Medium ⬤High ⬤Very high ⬤Very high
Applications

Utilizing Metaverse ⬤High ⬤Very high ⬤Medium ⬤High ⬤Medium ⬤Medium

Technologies for
Marketing and CX

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 Products and Customers Operations Competitive Partners and Talent and
Services and Buyers and Processes Landscape Ecosystems Resources

Definitions for scale of impact:

Very high = above 75% of business operations impacted for all tech providers
High = 50% to 75% of business operations impacted for all tech providers
Medium = 30% to 50% of business operations impacted for all tech providers
Low = below 30% of business operations impacted for all tech providers

Source: Gartner (January 2023)

Gartner, Inc. | G00779442 Page 2A of 2A

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