IT spending is expected to rise for many organizations this year—including investments related to data management technologies—according to industry research.
One recent report, from online IT marketplace Spiceworks, noted that aging IT infrastructure will drive IT budget increases at organizations across North America and Europe in 2019. Spiceworks surveyed 780 organizations in July 2018, and found that 89 percent expect their IT budgets to grow or remain flat in 2019.
Factors driving budget increases vary significantly by company size, the report said. But 64 percent of those planning to increase budgets are doing so to upgrade outdated IT infrastructure.
Across all company sizes, 38 percent of organizations expect IT budgets to increase this year. Organizations that expect budget increases anticipate a 20 percent increase on average, up from 19 percent in 2018. Only 6 percent of companies expect their IT budget to decrease in 2019. Larger organizations are most likely to see their budgets grow.
Another study, by research firm Gartner Inc., predicted that global IT spending will grow 3 percent to $3.8 trillion in 2019.
Enterprise software spending is expected to see the highest growth, with an 8 percent increase in 2019. Software-as-a-service (SaaS) is driving growth in almost all software segments, particularly customer relationship management (CRM), due to increased focus on providing better customer experiences, Gartner said.
IT services will be a key driver for spending in 2019, the report said. An expected slowdown in the global economy, along with internal pressures to cut spending, is driving organizations to optimize enterprise external spending for business services such as consulting.
