Worldwide IT spending is set to fall by 6% this year as the dual
problems of recession and exchange rates continue to impact the
market.
Analyst firm Gartner, has revised its predictions of an overall
decline of 3.8% from the first quarter upwards, as tough conditions
continue to eat into spending.
A drop of 6% means total worldwide spending on IT will drop to
$3.2 trillion from $3.4 trillion in 2008.
Although many economists believe the recession has entered a
levelling off period before the recovery starts problems with
confidence persist and are undermining the willingness of customers
to spend.
"While the global economic downturn shows signs of easing, this
year IT budgets are still being cut and consumers will need a lot
more persuading before they can feel confident enough to loosen
their purse strings," said Richard Gordon, research vice president
and head of global forecasting at Gartner.
The decline in spending growth in both hardware and software had
almost stabilised but the "full impact of the recession on the IT
services and telecommunications sectors is still emerging," he
said. As a result growth in those sectors was being revised
downwards.
Hardware has been hardest hit with a 16.3% decline in spending
and flat sales predicted for 2010, followed by services with a 5.6%
drop and telecoms with a 4.6 reduction. This leaving software as
the brightest area with a small dip into the red of 1.6%
A version of this story originally appeared on
Microscope.