Not long ago, IDC, the world's leading IT market research and consulting company, released the "2021 China Electronic Signature Solution Market Share Report" (hereinafter referred to as the "Report"). The report shows that in 2021, China's electronic signature market developed rapidly, and under the extensive market demand and frequent favorable policies, the size of China's electronic signature software market has reached 73.32 million US dollars, a year-on-year increase of 31.7%.
IDC predicts that as the scale of China's digital transformation spending continues to grow, the future development potential of China's electronic signature software products will be further unleashed. It is estimated that by 2026, the size of China's electronic signature software market will reach about 240 million US dollars, and the overall market will grow at a compound annual growth rate of 26.4% in the next five years.
From no one in the past to today's standpoint, electronic signatures have entered a cooling-off period after experiencing a spurt of development. Demand and concerns are together, growth and chaos are intertwined, and the second half of domestic electronic signing not only lengthens the competition front, but also has new changes in industry rules.
First, the epidemic has changed in seconds, and capital has chased large factories to enter the game
The large scale of various domestic market entities provides a broad digital space for the domestic electronic signature industry. Although with the tightening of Internet financial regulation, the electronic signature industry has also been affected to a certain extent. However, the arrival of the epidemic and the prevalence of paperless office have rapidly ushered in the second spring of development of the electronic signature industry.
Affected by the epidemic in recent years, the surge in online office and remote video calls has indirectly driven the electronic signature market. Especially in 2021.
From a policy perspective, the 14th Five-Year Plan (2021~2025) and the outline of the long-term goals for 2035 both propose to build a digital China and accelerate the promotion of digital industrialization. Many provinces and municipalities, including Shanghai, Beijing, Shenzhen, Chongqing, Guangdong, etc., have clearly proposed to vigorously promote the use of electronic signatures and build a unified electronic seal platform in the implementation plan of the government's digital construction.
These standardized policies not only deepen customers' understanding and education of the electronic signature industry, but also make sufficient official endorsement for the rapid development of electronic signatures.
At the social level, in 2021, the epidemic prevention and control entered the normalization, online office scenarios became more and more common, and electronic signatures spawned a large number of new online business scenarios in all walks of life, and rapidly grew into a track with a market capacity of more than 100 billion.
At the same time, capital continues to increase the code of the electronic signature industry, Qiming, Shunwei, Centurium, Shenzhen Venture Capital and other capital parties have successively rushed to raise funds, Fada, Shangshang, e-signature treasure and other leading manufacturers are highly sought after, and large manufacturers such as Tencent, Byte, etc. are also launching their own electronic signature applications, trying to get a piece of the pie.
According to the data, in 2021, Shanghai signed and announced the completion of 358 million yuan of Series C financing; Fada's completion of Series D financing of 900 million yuan; and eSignature received an E round of 1.2 billion investment led by Sequoia Capital and IDG Capital. From 2015 to the end of 2021, the total financing of major electronic signature manufacturers exceeded 4.5 billion yuan.
However, under the barbaric growth in the early stage of the development of the industry, there are many problems that follow.
Market share has always been a must for enterprises, and regarding the market share data of electronic signature in 2020, the first place in the industry varies in the reports produced by different institutions.
In IDC's "2020 China Electronic Signature Software Market Share", Fada ranked first with a market share of 26.4%. In the same year, in iMedia Consulting's "2020-2021 China Electronic Signature Industry Development Status and User Research and Analysis Report", it was shown that "in the proportion of Chinese electronic signature users using service provider brands in 2020, eSignature reached 43.1%, firmly occupying the first position in the market share".
In May last year, information on administrative penalties was published in the national enterprise credit information publicity system. According to the announcement, the relevant conclusions on "eSignature Market Leading" in the two reports of "Special Analysis Report on Human Resources Electronic Signing Market 2020" and "Special Analysis of China's Electronic Signing Market 2019" only come from user research questionnaires. After investigation, the parties concerned had cooperative relations and economic exchanges with eSign, which violated the Anti-Unfair Competition Law.
At this point, everyone understands that some data institutions that are regarded as objective and authoritative have "moisture" to add to their reports, and their credibility is questionable.
Of course, in addition to "operating" data for "white public relations", there will be no less secret "black public relations" means. Last year, the Hangzhou Internet Court accepted a case in which Mao, a self-media practitioner, ordered him to delete the infringing article and publicly apologize for publishing a false article that constituted an infringement of the right to reputation on the signature.
The real explosive growth of electronic signatures is only in recent years, and it is not surprising that the above phenomenon has occurred in the early stage, and such a phenomenon even exists more or less in every industry. And the motivation behind these actions is not difficult to understand, nothing more than to gain a competitive advantage. However, these so-called "shortcuts", after entering the second half of the industry, can not enable enterprises to embark on the road of evergreen industry.
Second, the competitive landscape is becoming more and more complex, and the players of the three parties have their own merits
Under the wind, the number of players in the electronic signature track has shown geometric growth, and the competitive landscape in the industry has become more and more complex. For now, there are three main types of players in the industry:
The first is the head start-up SaaS electronic signature manufacturer represented by Fada, e-signature treasure, and upper signature;
the second is Internet electronic signature manufacturers represented by Tencent, Byte, Ali, Jingdong, etc.;
The third is an electronic signature manufacturer transformed from a traditional software vendor, such as the contract lock launched by Panwei.
Compared with the three, they all have their own advantages and disadvantages.
First of all, the law established in 2014 has developed for nearly 10 years, and the earlier eSignature has 20 years of industry experience. As an early entry of SaaS electronic signature manufacturers, they have first-mover advantages in technology, products, services and other aspects and have a higher degree of professionalism. At the same time, such manufacturers will also be more complete in terms of safety qualifications and licenses.
However, it is difficult for the simple electronic signature function to become the starting point for the digital transformation of enterprises, and now enterprises need more integrated digital solutions. The B-side foundation of such manufacturers is still shallow, and the cost of acquiring customers is generally high, which is why they accept giant financing and actively integrate into the ecology of large manufacturers.
The second is the Internet electronic signature represented by Tencent, Byte, Ali, Jingdong, etc.
Compared with other manufacturers, these Internet giants have relatively stable B-end customer resources and extensive investment territory, which gives them a wide appeal in the B-end market and lower overall customer acquisition costs. At the same time, the technical reserves of large manufacturers are also more sufficient, for example, Ant Financial's blockchain technology is used for electronic signature security authentication, which greatly improves the security and confidentiality of "cloud" contracts.
In terms of subdivision, to enter the electronic signature market, Ali and Tencent choose to bind with electronic signature companies, so as to introduce their own digital solutions (such as Ali and eSignature cooperation, Tencent and Fada cooperation). Byte and JD.com chose to establish an electronic signature product R&D team internally to collaborate with other business solutions through their own product design (such as Byte's electronic traction, JD.com's Zhenzhen chain electronic contract platform).
Of course, in the short term, large manufacturers are also facing problems such as incomplete security qualification licenses and insufficient reserves of professional and technical personnel for electronic signatures.
Finally, there are the traditional software vendors (mainly some CA and OA vendors) that have been transformed, such as Fanwei (contract lock), digital authentication, Ansotong (one signature), Kinge, etc.
The advantages of such manufacturers participating in electronic signatures lie in the synergy advantages of business and their influence on vertical industry customers in terms of brand, scale and customization capabilities.
For example, in the survey and design industry, Ansutong occupies more than 80% of the market share, and also has more than 60% of the market share in steel and large-scale construction enterprises; In the medical education industry, digital certification occupies more than 60% of the market share; The contract lock is committed to the electronic signature and printing control management needs of large government enterprises.
At present, the strategy of traditional CA manufacturers is to open the market through the original customer network, but this does not seem to be as expected in the electronic signature market that focuses on delivery results. And its delivery model data is absolutely private, requiring continuous investment of personnel and resources to maintain the normal operation of the system, software and hardware updates, so its delivery model has always been heavy.
Small and medium-sized enterprises are difficult to cover, and the industry needs new inflection points
After years of development, the electronic signature track is very mature at present, but it focuses on the user group, generally large enterprises and institutions, and the utilization rate of small and medium-sized enterprises and individuals is not high.
You know, the effect of electronic signing to reduce costs and increase efficiency needs to be based on a large number of "signature" actions and processes. For large enterprises and institutions, there are many management levels and personnel, and in the traditional signing process, a single contract and agreement need to consume a lot of manpower and financial resources in printing, transmission, storage management and other links. The purchase of electronic signature services can not only clearly perceive the decline in labor costs and material costs, and improve the efficiency of signatures, thereby accelerating business development, and the price is also very cost-effective.
The general aspects involved in contract management
Unlike individual users and small and medium-sized enterprises, the infrequent "signature" action and low mobility of physical space make it difficult for them to perceive the benefits brought by electronic signatures.
Moreover, the products provided by electronic signature manufacturers are often self-contained, and the operation pages and processes are also more complicated, with a certain learning threshold. The IT construction reserve of large enterprises can ensure that they can be mastered quickly, but it is not very friendly to individual users and small and medium-sized enterprises with relatively single business operations and the pursuit of certain cost performance.
In addition, there are still doubts about whether electronic signatures are safe and compliant. Large enterprises and institutions, with rich business strength and reserve strength, can also try to accept, trial and error, but it is relatively difficult for individual users and small and medium-sized enterprises to popularize applications.
At the same time, for electronic signature companies, it is not easy to form a network moat in the To B market.
On the one hand, the current head manufacturers have not formed a strong influence like C-end market products in products and services, and the dependence of head customers on fixed electronic signature customers is not strong. Moreover, the electronic signature industry is very dependent on upstream and downstream, which requires both upstream CA institutions to provide digital security certification, and also needs the help of industry ecology and partners (open data interfaces, APIs, etc.), which determines that it is difficult for a single enterprise to stand out.
Electronic signature industry chain map Image source: 36Kr Research Institute
On the other hand, there is no standardized service demand in the B-end market, and the needs of various types of customers for electronic signature manufacturers are differentiated, and electronic signature manufacturers can only meet the needs of the corresponding fields.
For example, Tencent e-signature mainly faces the contract issuance needs of C-end users; Shangshang focuses on the public cloud business of electronic signature, focusing on enterprise customers; At the same time, Fa Da has opened up three types of electronic signature service models: SaaS, SaaS API, and hybrid cloud, and focuses more on legal services. eSignature first started from government scenarios and large enterprises to do electronic signature localization business, and later transformed from a service provider to a SaaS platform.
Text/Wenlin, Editor/Yang Bocheng