IDC Names DocuSign a Leader in eSignature in Global Software Assessment

We are excited to announce that DocuSign has been named a Leader in the 2023 IDC Marketscape Worldwide eSignature Software Vendor Assessment. In the newly released report, IDC evaluates 18 electronic signature vendors across two critical criteria: strategies and capabilities.

As you can see from the 2023 Marketscape assessment below, DocuSign is well-positioned in both categories, and we also have the largest market share of all vendors analyzed.

An overview of today’s e-signature market

IDC’s report notes that in the last few years, “esignature software quickly changed from ‘nice to have’ to mission-critical software.” IDC predicts that it will stay that way because of the permanence of remote employees and flexible work models. The emergence of the hybrid workplace has led to a new understanding of the product category.

To take things a step further, IDC points out that e-signature tools are increasingly utilized as more than standalone products. Moving forward, these tools are “a component of a broader portfolio of content, identity or trust services.” It’s important to note that in this report, IDC overhauled its analysis criteria to include capabilities beyond traditional signature features. Some of those new considerations that count toward the final assessment are contract lifecycle management (CLM), audit trail data and identity verification and authentication.

IDC envisions a future where e-signature is the cornerstone of a wider effort to digitize and automate the entire document process. DocuSign has long been leading the charge on this digital transformation effort. The validation of our vision can be seen in the expansion of the IDC evaluation criteria. While IDC is considering CLM, audit trail and identity verification features for the first time in 2023, DocuSign has had mature products to meet these needs for years.

What makes DocuSign stand out among e-signature leaders

When comparing the vendors in IDC’s report, DocuSign stands out in both depth and breadth of offerings. Viewed through the lens of digitally transforming the entire agreement document process, DocuSign simply has far more robust capabilities than competing vendors. For this report, IDC evaluated 10 of DocuSign’s products from all stages of the agreement lifecycle. No other leader had more than six products to consider.

DocuSign has been at the forefront of e-signature providers for more than two decades. Part of that sustained leadership is a commitment to building innovative products that support our vision of the intelligent agreement future. 

Here’s what IDC has to say: “DocuSign offers customers a complete portfolio of solutions across the agreement value chain from document generation and dynamic web forms through the signing process and agreement analytics, including robust workflow automation capabilities.”

Looking ahead to upcoming e-signature advances, IDC predicts a series of trends, including:

• Development of capabilities based on large language models and generative AI 
• An increased number of e-signature capabilities embedded as part of a broader content services and CLM platform
• Intelligent forms, automated document generation, and bidirectional data management (including "smart contracts")
• Tighter integration with enterprise applications via connectors and APIs to extend automation and support a broader range of use cases

DocuSign continues to lead with intelligent contract features

These predictions are more validation of DocuSign’s historic innovation in the category. DocuSign customers don’t need to wait for these features, they’re available today. We offer a robust portfolio, including AI-powered Agreement Summarization, customizable document generation, an industry-leading CLM platform, flexible Web Forms and a suite of identification/authentication solutions. Additionally, we have the largest integration ecosystem in the agreements space, including over 400 ISVs and prebuilt integrations. In fact, more than half of DocuSign transactions today are already completed via API.

IDC specifically calls out our leadership in AI contracting technology. They note that DocuSign is already “leveraging generative AI and large language models to highlight key terms on mobile devices and to summarize longer agreements.”

If you want to read more about electronic signature tools and what makes DocuSign stand out, download the IDC Marketscape Worldwide eSignature Software 2023 Vendor Assessment.  

SOURCE: " IDC MarketScape: Worldwide eSignature Software 2023 Vendor Assessment”, By: Holly Muscolino, September 2023, IDC #US49646923

IDC MarketScape vendor analysis model is designed to provide an overview of the competitive fitness of ICT suppliers in a given market.  The research methodology utilizes a rigorous scoring methodology based on both qualitative and quantitative criteria that results in a single graphical illustration of each vendor’s position within a given market. The Capabilities score measures vendor product, go-to-market and business execution in the short-term. The Strategy score measures alignment of vendor strategies with customer requirements in a 3-5-year timeframe. Vendor market share is represented by the size of the circles.