AI Assurance & Certification: why TICs could be early-stage beneficiaries

Research evidence excerpt

AI Assurance & Certification: why TICs could be early-stage beneficiaries

Executive summary

AI certification and assurance: an emerging new growth area for TICs

One of the emerging, but key investor debates in the TIC space in our view is whether AI

assurance can become a meaningful revenue opportunity for TICs or not. We believe it

can, and we see the opportunity extending beyond certification itself and including

training, readiness assessments, gap analysis, technical testing, auditing and

compliance-related conformity support. We see Certification / Business Assurance (BA)

growing HSD FY26-28E across our TIC names, and we believe that organic revenue

growth could move into double-digit territory by 2030 for the sector as AI regulation

shifts from principles to evidence-based compliance. For both BVI and SGS, assuming all

other divisions at flat growth rates in FY29-31, Certification/BA growing DD would

support c6.5% group organic growth in 2030/31, as a conservative scenario.

Market sizing is tough, but could be up to $13bn+ by 2035 on our estimates

Market sizing remains difficult, as available estimates often mix third-party assurance,

technical testing, software tools, consulting and in-house assurance activity. We look at

the UK market, however, as a proxy given the UK DSIT provides a useful directional

benchmark, estimating the UK AI assurance market growing at c18.5% CAGR FY24-35

(to c£6.5bn by 2035 GVA) under its status-quo scenario. In our view, this could mean up

to £205bn GVA for the global AI assurance market by 2035. Assuming TICs penetrate

c5% of that, it would imply a >£10bn ($13.7bn) market opportunity for Testers.

Beyond ISO/IEC 42001: a world of opportunity

ISO/IEC 42001 is currently the most “popular” voluntary standard, but we see it primarily