Recent tariff headlines aren’t the real issue for enterprise software; confidence is. In uncertain times, enterprise software buyers will reward resilience, cost control, and outcomes. Vendors must take note.
Omdia view
Summary
Geopolitical tensions won’t reshape enterprise software economics overnight, but they undoubtedly change how software buyers think, question, and commit technology budgets. This week’s renewed EU–US tariff tensions are less about whether areas such as enterprise software as a service (SaaS) are directly affected and more about confidence—confidence across areas such as cost predictability, delivery models, and long-term technology choices. In these uncertain conditions, enterprise buyers will focus on resilience, optionality, and measurable outcomes. For vendors, proof will trump ambition.
Confidence, not tariffs, is the real talking point
This week’s tariff noise is going to accelerate an enterprise software trend that is already well underway, namely, increased focus and scrutiny on data residency and where platforms are actually delivered from. Businesses are showing less tolerance for single-region or single-vendor dependency, and there is growing pressure on vendors to prove outcomes, not just capabilities.
While headlines focus on whether enterprise software itself could be tariffed, this framing misses the more important signal. Enterprise software decisions are deeply tied to long-term confidence, in pricing stability, delivery continuity, regulatory alignment, and architectural optionality. When geopolitics becomes louder, that confidence becomes harder to sustain.
This is not hypothetical. Our latest Omdia workplace transformation survey data already shows how enterprises are framing platform investment decisions. Productivity, security and risk management, cost reduction through consolidation, and workflow efficiency consistently outweigh more speculative or future-state drivers. In practical terms, enterprises are placing confidence in technologies that deliver tangible operational value today rather than ambition that depends on stable external conditions tomorrow. This shift explains why buyers are not pulling back wholesale but are slowing, phasing, and questioning more aggressively. It is also why multiyear, all-or-nothing platform commitments are coming under renewed scrutiny.
What this means for vendors: Outcomes over optimism
Fundamentally, confidence is fragile when geopolitics get loud. That fragility shows up quickly in boardrooms and procurement cycles, particularly for enterprise software that sits on top of global infrastructure. Cloud services, data centers, hardware supply chains, partners, and networks all operate across borders. Friction at those layers inevitably surfaces in enterprise software conversations, even when there is no direct impact on the software itself.
For vendors, this creates a clear dividing line. Those that can articulate how their platforms reduce risk, improve efficiency, and deliver measurable outcomes will continue to find budget. Those relying on vision decks, vague transformation narratives, or future-state promises will face far more resistance when boards are already nervous.
This is not a “buyers stop buying” moment; it is a discipline moment. Enterprises will still invest, but they will do so with sharper questions around resilience, cost exposure, and time to value. Vendors that have built their propositions for stable, optimistic conditions will feel the strain. Vendors that are designed to operate in volatility will differentiate. Tariffs will not break enterprise software economics, but they will expose which vendors are resilient.
Appendix
Author
Adam Holtby, Principal Analyst, Workplace Transformation
