Top Analyst Firms’ View of IT Demand in 2010
Informed guessing is a numbers game for analysts, and the good news is that those numbers are positive.†
By Lauren Gibbons Paul
Gartner Inc.
The IT industry will return to growth (estimated at 3.3 percent annually across all size companies) in 2010, but the market will not recover to 2008 revenue levels before 2012. For more than 50 percent of CIOs, the IT budget will be zero percent or less in growth terms, slowly improving in 2011, according to Peter Sondergaard, senior vice president of research.
Forrester Research Inc.
More than 20 percent of small and medium-size businesses surveyed by the analyst firm plan to increase their IT spend in 2010 vs. only 16 percent of large enterprises, according to senior analyst Tim Harmon.†Nearly 40 percent of SMBs will hold their IT spend steady, and 39 percent will decrease vs. 36 percent and 47 percent, respectively, for large enterprises.
IDC
IT spending has declined more slowly among lower midsize firms (with 100 to 250 employees), and these companies will be among the fastest to bounce back, according to senior analyst Justin Jaffe. Total North American small and midsize business IT spending was flat in 2008, dipped in 2009, and will become positive (although not dramatically) in 2010.
