The future
up closeWORLD QUALITY REPORT
15th Edition 2023-24

NORDICS
The race to be a quality
champion continues
Over the past decades, various transformations led to a rapid
maturity of the Nordic Quality Engineering (QE) space, turning
it into a thriving ecosystem.
With unique players of its own, the Nordic testing and quality
environment is classified by various players, including systems
integrators, digital development boutiques, large companies
offering development services, and specialists dedicated solelyto quality engineering and testing.
It’s the presence of such niche players that has made it aremarkably interesting market, prompting innovators to drive
trends like platform engineering, unit testing, cloud adoption
and digital core integration.

Trends we are seeing today
There have been various implications of cloud adoptionsin the Nordics. On one hand, we see that cloud adoption
for testing seems to vary across organizations and is often
managed by clients themselves or the cloud infrastructure
providers. On the other hand, we see the adoption of cloudand digital core driving the development of newer, faster,connected, and intelligent products.
Both trends have opened new opportunities for QE
companies in terms of the validation and testing1

requirements, particularly in areas such as IoT (Internet ofThings), embedded systems, and AI-driven applications.
However, while this opens new gateways, it also raises
questions about cybersecurity and privacy which havebecome a major concern now.
In Denmark, GDPR (General Data Protection Regulation)
regulations have driven the need for more robust test data
management practices. Organizations are looking for ways
to anonymize and protect sensitive data while ensuring it isreadily available for testing purposes. This is likely to continue
as data privacy regulations become more stringent.
This focus on security and performance is gaining prominence
across the board driving functions like SRE (Site ReliabilityEngineering) and Chaos Engineering, which is pushingbusinesses to re-look at the stability and reliabilityof applications.
For instance, as test automation and quality lifecycle
automation gain momentum, we are seeing an increasingneed to verify the robustness and reliability of applications
while testing them. This is especially prominent now, whenmore and more organizations are beginning to use no-codeand low-code tools. These tools sometimes trade off aspectsof security and performance in terms of maintaining stableand effective test suites for the sake of convenience. We think
this emphasis on security will drive more transformations in
QE in the coming years.

The era of automation
As highlighted last year, automation has matured in theNordics and moved beyond functional testing to include
non-functional areas. We are seeing significant changes in
how automation is involved in test environments and test

data this year. Norway and Denmark are showing a growinginterest in test data management. Despite data security
and privacy concerns, the call for automation stems fromthe growing popularity of Machine Learning, AI (ArtificialIntelligence), and Gen AI (Generative AI) which can be used
to make test data insertion and usage a swift and efficient
process. This could be what is driving the rise in demandfor cloud automation too. With production systems and test
environments migrating to the cloud, organizations
can now rewrite their core applications to match modern
ways of working. And we think, after Automation, AI could be
the next big thing transforming waysof working.
AI, particularly Gen AI, has attracted significant traction andis emerging as one of the most captivating and talked about
technology trend. The Nordic countries, while displaying akeen interest in leveraging them to augment their business
operations, remain in a state of uncertainty regarding thefuture ramifications of this technological evolution.
However, AI without a doubt, is changing and shall continue tochange every industry it touches, including our QE and testing
practices, approach to the market, and ways of working. The
onus of adapting to these changing demands falls on qualityengineers. Today’s QEs are also expected to go above andbeyond to understand the heart of businesses, align with
their values, and become architects of reliable businessquality infrastructures. Organizations are looking for QEs who
possess consultancy skills, and effectively communicate withbusiness stakeholders, which clearly denotes a shift in therole of QEs.

Evolution and the future
In the past, Nordics has demonstrated that it recognizes theimportance of quality engineering professionals who canenable and activate digital transformation projects. In thefuture, there will be a greater emphasis on early engagement,

ensuring that quality engineering is integrated into theproject’s design and planning phases.
This will have an enormous impact on subjects likesustainability, which often need an end-to-end approach toprovide true value.
It is refreshing to see that Nordics has not confined
QE to traditional migration efforts, but is viewing it frombroader business change perspectives, with CIOs and CXOs
bringing it into boardroom conversations and utilizing its
potential. Next year, we will continue to see the region
mature and project interesting trends that could re-shape
the global QE landscape.

Survey Watch

84%

Organizations are consistently investingin AI to improve quality processes

41%

Organizations cited lack of tools
as a major roadblock to Automation

72%

Organizations used Value Stream
Mapping and related techniques tooptimize IT lifecycles

84%

Organizations said Cloud andInfrastructure testing is mandatory
for applications hosted on the cloud.

Download the World Quality Reportwww.worldqualityreport.com
or Scan the QR code

Contact OpenText
If you desire more information about testing tools,
please contact:

Juha Vaitilo
CSO & Quality Assurance and Testing Practice Lead,Sogeti Finland

Monica Garcia Manzanares
Global Campaign Manager, OpenText
mgarciamanza@opentext.com

Morten Løvstad
CEO, Sogeti Norway

I N A S S OCI AT ION WI T H :2