BOSTON – January 29, 2024– Bain & Company has been recognized as a Leader in the IDC MarketScape: Worldwide Experience Design Services 2023-2024 Vendor Assessment (Doc # US49988123, December 2023). The firm’s position was based on extensive analysis and client advocacy. The report highlights that “Bain is a good choice for organizations looking for a tier 1 strategy and experience consultancy combining deep industry, consumer, and client knowledge with a strong pragmatic focus.”

Bain’s Innovation & Design (I&D) team is comprised of more than 350 global experts and has unique Design competencies to support a variety of opportunities in Service Design, Physical Design, and Experience Design. The firm hires broad-skilled designers who can bridge various design domains, a key differentiator in the consultant landscape. One consistent competency is the team’s deep command of the user, consumer and customer, as it designs with the user at the center.

The report finds several core areas of strength for Bain, including:

• “Bain has a strong background in business consulting, including strategy consulting and digital-related consulting. The firm is known for its focus on customer experience, for example, through its work on NPS, and has a strong set of supporting assets and tools.”
• “Based on conversations with Bain's clients, the three areas where, on average, Bain's reference clients commend the firm most highly are design excellence, people quality, and innovation and creativity.”

“It’s an honor to be recognized as a worldwide Leader in the IDC MarketScape in Experience Design Services,” said Arpan Sheth, a Bain partner and head of the firm’s global Innovation & Design practice. “Our goal is to create the highest value for our clients, and design is typically one value-creation lever to solving problems or chasing opportunities—design works in an integrated way across disciplines and is a key contributor to the business impact we can make. Our team members join multi-dimensional expert teams (strategy, advanced analytics, engineering, etc.) to play a critical role in developing the solutions we recommend.”

In regard to Service Design, the report notes “Bain's Innovation & Design team includes service design experts who work cross-functionally with experts from Bain's customer experience practice to serve engagements across industries and markets within each region.”

The report recognized Bain’s “network of 13 dedicated Digital Innovation Hubs across the globe, where clients connect with the firm's design strategists and innovation experts to explore disruption and design or redesign products and experiences,” and also highlights the firm’s “physical product and 3D environment design capabilities through dedicated product and environment design experts based in its global network of design studios.”

The report highlights the use of the firm’s proprietary service design tools and assets, including:

• “12 AI-driven tools, including Sage, a proprietary ChatGPT-powered platform that rapidly synthesizes firmwide information, data, and insights to drive client work
• NPS Prism, customer experience benchmarking software
• Pyxis, a tool that combines alternative data, AI-driven analytics, and institutional investor-led insights to analyze consumer spending behavior
• Bain Radar 360 Strategy GPS, a tool to evaluate clients' digital capabilities
• Bain Digital Inventory, a tool to synthesize existing digital activity within a client organization along 10 pillars of a digital transformation”

“We approach design holistically and aim to take on strategic innovation and design projects, we typically try to not limit scope to production design,” said Sarah Dey Burton, a Bain partner and leader in the firm’s Innovation & Design practice. “We do not design for the sake of designing and the value we add is tied to business results, and broader customer-centric business transformation ambitions.”

An excerpt copy of the IDC MarketScape report can be accessed here.

Source: "IDC MarketScape: Worldwide Experience Design Services 2023–2024 Vendor Assessment", by: Douglas Hayward, December 2023, IDC #US49988123

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.

Editor's Note: To arrange an interview, contact Dan Pinkney at dan.pinkney@bain.com or +1 646 562 8102.

About Bain & Company  

Bain & Company is a global consultancy that helps the world’s most ambitious change makers define the future.  

Across 65 cities in 40 countries, we work alongside our clients as one team with a shared ambition to achieve extraordinary results, outperform the competition, and redefine industries. We complement our tailored, integrated expertise with a vibrant ecosystem of digital innovators to deliver better, faster, and more enduring outcomes. Our 10-year commitment to invest more than $1 billion in pro bono services brings our talent, expertise, and insight to organizations tackling today’s urgent challenges in education, racial equity, social justice, economic development, and the environment. We earned a platinum rating from EcoVadis, the leading platform for environmental, social, and ethical performance ratings for global supply chains, putting us in the top 1% of all companies. Since our founding in 1973, we have measured our success by the success of our clients, and we proudly maintain the highest level of client advocacy in the industry.  

About IDC MarketScape

IDC MarketScape vendor assessment model is designed to provide an overview of the competitive fitness of ICT (information and communications technology) 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. IDC MarketScape provides a clear framework in which the product and service offerings, capabilities and strategies, and current and future market success factors of IT and telecommunications vendors can be compared. The framework also provides technology buyers with a 360-degree assessment of the strengths and weaknesses of current and prospective vendors.