The RiskTech Journal
The RiskTech Journal is your premier source for insights on cutting-edge risk management technologies. We deliver expert analysis, industry trends, and practical solutions to help professionals stay ahead in an ever-changing risk landscape. Join us to explore the innovations shaping the future of risk management.
IRM Market Brief: Grant Thornton Survey Points to Rising IRM Demand
Two thirds of business leaders say integrated risk management is a top priority. Fewer than half have built it. That is the headline of Grant Thornton's 2026 Cyber & Risk Survey of 1,100 senior leaders, published October 13. The first number is the demand, stated by buyers in their own words. The second is how much of it has been met.
The survey landed six days after Wheelhouse Advisors published the 2026-2027 IRM Navigator Vendor Compass for GRC, the first of four reports covering the segments on the IRM Navigator Curve's investment path: GRC, ERM, ORM, and TRM. The Vendor Compass asks the same question from the supply side: how far does the evidence a GRC provider produces travel into enterprise, operational, and technology risk decisions? This edition reads the two documents as a pair. The answer comes first; the evidence follows.
Where Do 33 Providers Land on the 2026-2027 IRM Navigator Vendor Compass for GRC?
The 2026-2027 IRM Navigator Vendor Compass for Governance, Risk and Compliance (GRC) is Wheelhouse Advisors' evaluation of the providers that supply GRC capability to the enterprise. It covers 33 providers, 24 technology providers and nine services providers, all constituents of the 2026-2027 IRM50, and places each one in one of three categories according to its position on two axes. The graphic below shows the categories and the providers in each. The report shows where each provider sits on the axes and why, with a profile and placement rationale for every one.
GRC is the verification system of integrated risk management (IRM). It supplies the auditable evidence that connects the goals set in enterprise risk management (ERM), the processes run in operational risk management (ORM), and the assets governed in technology risk management (TRM) to accountable policies, certifiable controls, and reliable disclosures. The report evaluates providers on how well they produce that evidence and how far it travels.
The IRM Vendor Market: What the Major Analyst Firms Won’t or Can’t Tell You
The IRM vendor market spans five segments — GRC, ERM, ORM, TRM, and Risk Management Consulting — but no major analyst firm covers all five in a single research program. Gartner focuses exclusively on Assurance Leaders. Forrester and IDC treat GRC and cybersecurity as separate tracks. The 2025-2026 IRM Navigator™ Vendor Compass from Wheelhouse Advisors is the only research series that evaluates vendors across all five IRM segments using a consistent methodology. This article explains how buyers, investors, and vendors can use the free interactive Vendor Compass Segment Summary to answer the market questions that traditional analyst research leaves unanswered.
GRC Without Visionaries: What the 2025 Gartner® Magic Quadrant™ Reveals About the Future of Risk
The release of the “2025 Gartner® Magic Quadrant™ for Governance, Risk and Compliance (GRC) Tools, Assurance Leaders” marks an important turning point in the evolution of enterprise risk technology. For the first time in nearly two decades of coverage, Gartner has explicitly defined the GRC category around assurance leaders rather than enterprise risk or governance audiences.
Equally significant is the visual structure of the 2025 quadrant, which contains an entirely empty Visionaries section. While some may interpret this as a sign of stagnation, it more accurately reflects a market that has entered its integration phase. The GRC segment has reached functional maturity and operational stability, creating the foundation upon which the next generation of Integrated Risk Management (IRM) and Autonomous IRM capabilities will develop.
Here, we analyze the implications of the 2025 Magic Quadrant through the lens of the IRM Navigator™ Model and the recent IRM Navigator™ Vendor Compass for Governance, Risk and Compliance (GRC) - 2025 Edition. Our research concludes that the absence of Visionaries does not indicate a failure of innovation, but rather the outcome of successful specialization. GRC has become the operational core of enterprise assurance, while IRM now defines the broader architecture of enterprise confidence and decision intelligence.