OK, here's your pop quiz: does GCR stand for Gartner Custom Research or Griggs-Anderson Research? As of today it stands for both, as Gartner has decided to sell off its custom research business unit to GCR Custom Research, formerly Griggs-Anderson Research. The email announcement circulating this afternoon notes that GCR will continue to provide primary research services to Gartner for the next eight years as a part of the purchase agreement. A nice piece of outsourcing at a time when Gartner and other major I.T. research houses are trying to find the meatier part of the business. Standing field research units are useful but increased Web surveying, tools such as online sales lead generation services and Web statistics analysis are building shorter paths to understanding market behavior. These capabilities are important to Gartner but require shifting the mix of skill sets. Better to have existing custom research skill sets deployed where their pipelines can be filled more easily across a broader range of market sectors. Sounds like a good move for both parties, and a continuation of Gartner's focus on getting its margins to be as healthy as possible in a shifting market for I.T. research services.