From drug discovery to care delivery to enabling technology, companies in the health industry are facing an ever more daunting list of market and financial forces. Which companies should partner, merge, license, or divest - and why?

The healthcare sector is expected to be one of the greatest beneficiaries of productivity improvements generated through increasingly automated and integrated processes, creating a particularly strong market for companies offering business process outsourcing (BPO). IDC expects spending for IT outsourcing in the healthcare sector to grow at an annual rate of 25.7 percent.

RCW Mirus has compiled a comprehensive research report based on sectors within the security industry that, we believe, have the greatest growth potential and overall market impact, including Automatic Identification (Auto-ID), CCTV & Surveillance and Security Services.

Those focused on the enterprise software industry and the Customer Relationship Management (CRM) software space have been left waiting for what everyone has been expecting all along--consolidation. This inevitable dance has been postponed for the better part of three years with the exception of select deals here and there. Why do we view consolidation as inevitable and why has it been delayed so long? These are some of the questions that we will address in this CRM Spotlight.

RCW Mirus expects consolidation in the security market to accelerate in 2002, as conglomerates look to bolster their security stance and large, pure security plays seek to extend their geographic reach and augment the depth of their products and services.