Growth Opportunities to Prepare Participants for Success After the Pandemic
Germany is the second-largest market for FM in Europe (after the UK) and is one of the fastest growing markets. It will present strong opportunities to incumbent suppliers, as well as attract new entrants from outside the country. The German FM market has the highest potential among all European markets but is underpenetrated due to high reliance on in-house FM. The market will witness good growth in the coming years.
Meanwhile, with FM services commoditising and organic growth hard to find, companies need to innovate to keep growing and remain profitable. The industry will continue to move towards service integration and sophisticated advisory services focused on business productivity, and M&A activities will continue.
Meanwhile, COVID-19 is having a severe effect on all customer sectors. The German FM market saw a revenue drop of 7.1% in 2020 due to the pandemic. The market will return to growth in 2021, but will not reach 2019 levels until late 2021 or early 2022.
Healthcare, government, and education will be the fastest-growing customer segments during the forecast period. Meanwhile, hard (technical) services will outstrip soft (support) services in terms of revenue growth. There are opportunities for companies that target the highest growth services and sectors, but there are also significant challenges for those that fail to adapt. Meanwhile, collaboration and partnership are increasingly critical as technology and new business models disrupt the German market.
