Considerable growth among information technology budgets and staff was uncovered by recent research by
These trends were uncovered in the most recent Spiceworks State of SMB IT technology survey, a global study of more than 3,000 IT professionals investigating the latest technology trends among SMBs with fewer than 1,000 employees. The survey was conducted in January and February 2011.
The study showed that IT budgets in 2011 grew 8% compared the second half of 2010 – the largest increase in more than 18 months. Other signs of expansion include nearly 31% planning to hire IT staff. Of companies with less than 20 employees, 33% are planning to increase IT staff compared to only 17% of companies with 20 employees or more.
Cloud services are now used by 28% of SMBs, compared to mid-year 2010 (14%). By mid-2011, says Spiceworks, cloud usage among SMBs is expected to rise to 42%. In addition, 26% of SMB IT budgets are earmarked for hosted and cloud services.
Almost one in three SMBs (30%) plan to change the way data is stored, moving more data to the cloud. By mid-2011, SMBs who plan to change the way they store data will triple their online/hosted/cloud storage usage from 3% to 9%.
Virtualization is gaining, with 54% of SMB respondents currently using virtualization and another 20% planning to use virtualization by midyear 2011. Among SMBs currently using virtualization, 54% are putting core apps in virtual environments. Virtualization is the No. 1 planned new software purchase among SMBs, with 25% planning a new virtualization software purchase.
"Small businesses are responsible for half of all IT spending," said Jay Halberg, co-founder and vice president of Marketing for Spiceworks. "All signs point to a good year for the IT industry as SMBs around the world significantly boost investments in technology products and services as well as staffing."
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