Total ICT Spending to Increase by 5 percent in 2012

You may think that the worldwide economic downturn has negatively impacted most CIO's budgets, but so far that hasn't been the case. According to the latest market study by IDC, worldwide IT spending remains on course to grow by 6 percent this year in constant currency, that's only slightly down on last year's pace of 7 percent growth.

Strong performance in software, storage, enterprise network and mobile device markets has offset weaker trends in PCs, servers, peripherals and telecom provider equipment. However, the strength of the U.S. dollar in the first half of 2012 means that IT spending is on course for growth of just 4 percent this year.

Including telecom services, it's now estimated that total ICT spending will increase by 5 percent this year in constant currency to $3.6 trillion (that's growth of 2.5 percent in U.S. dollars).

"In spite of economic uncertainty, which continues to inhibit enterprise investment in some tech segments, the continuing demand for tablets, smartphones, storage capacity and network performance improvements actually outperformed expectations in the first half of the year," said Stephen Minton, Vice President, IDC Global Technology and Industry Research.

That being said, software spending has been very robust -- even in regions where economic trends have been weakest -- as businesses turn to software tools and cloud applications as a means of implementing their IT cost-reduction strategies.

Key Trends in the Worldwide IT Market include:

• American business spending on IT remains on course for weaker performance than 2011 with growth of 5.9% (down from 8.5% last year); the launch of Windows 8 in Q4 may help to drive a meaningful recovery in the PC market next year.
• While Western Europe remains weak overall due to the slow economy, software growth in Northern Europe was robust, and mobile device shipments (smartphones and tablets) have remained on course; excluding mobile devices, however, Europe is on course for just 1% growth in constant currency (a -4.5% decline in U.S. dollars).
• The recovery in Japan has lost some momentum, with IT growth in constant currency now on course for an increase of just 2% this year before flat lining again in 2013.
• Growth in emerging markets is still relatively strong,; in China, where the manufacturing sector has been impacted by slowing exports to Europe, IT spending is now on course for 14% growth this year in constant currency (down from 25% growth in 2011), with PC spending on course for growth of just 7% after a weaker-than-expected first half (down from 19% growth in 2011).
• Strong growth is still expected in India (14%), Brazil (14%), Russia (11%) and South Africa (8%).
• Overall Worldwide IT spending is now expected to grow by 6% in 2013 to $2.1 trillion (ICT spending including telecom services will increase by 5% next year to $3.8 trillion).

"In particular, the strength of software spending seems to prove that many enterprises have unlocked significant productivity and efficiency improvements. If the economy avoids downside scenarios in the second half of the year, a PC upgrade cycle in 2013 should help to maintain this momentum," said Minton.

IDC provides forecasts for IT spending in 54 countries around the world. These forecasts focus on 25 individual market segments across hardware, software, IT services, and telecom services for individual countries in all regions -- including North America, Latin America, Western Europe, Eastern Europe, Asia-Pacific, the Middle East, and Africa.

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Managed Cloud Service Provider Deployment Plans

 As more multinational business executives and IT managers consider embracing managed cloud service offerings, many are wondering how the service provider landscape is evolving -- and where providers plan to differentiate their capabilities.

Much of the initial market insight focused on the key emerging trends, but now we're starting to see more detailed analysis.

A new market study by Infonetics Research details operator plans for managed cloud services -- including their strategies and approaches to offering services, how services will be delivered now and in the future, and top applications of each type of cloud service including: Software as a Service (SaaS), Infrastructure as a Service (IaaS), and Platform as a Service (PaaS).

Their latest worldwide study resulted in the report entitled "Cloud Service Strategies: Global Service Provider Survey," where Infonetics analysts interviewed 20 incumbent telco, competitive, data center operators, and cable operators that offer cloud services -- now, or they plan to by 2013.

Investing in New Service Delivery Platforms

"Service providers around the world have embraced the cloud concept in earnest and are heavily investing in new services and service delivery platforms based on their particular areas of expertise. Internet content providers are leading with SaaS, data center and co-location operators are adding IaaS to their product portfolios and investing in additional infrastructure facilities, and traditional telcos are building on their existing networks and adding a range of services," said Sam Barnett, Infonetics Research's directing analyst for data center and cloud.

Highlights from the Cloud Service Survey Include:

• 70 percent of respondent operators are investing in cloud services in anticipation of demand.
• The top operator strategies for offering cloud services are bundling cloud services with network connectivity services and offering cloud services over Ethernet or IP VPN services.
• Many of the smaller data center providers participating in Infonetics' survey plan to keep their business uncomplicated by moving from simple collocation support offerings to IaaS via the addition of computer and storage hardware, rather than getting into the complexities of offering OS software platforms.
• 95 percent of respondent operators offer IaaS now.
• More sophisticated offerings like platform as a service, or PaaS (formed by the addition of server operating systems such as Windows, Linux, and Unix) and software as a service, or SaaS (such as e-mail and security services offered by telcos and ICPs like Google) are currently offered by fewer operators, but will grow significantly by 2013.

All the Infonetics survey respondents are knowledgeable purchase decision-makers at service providers in EMEA (Europe, Middle East, Africa), Asia Pacific, and North America that together represent 20 percent of the world's telecom carrier revenue and 21 percent of the world's telecommunications service provider capital expenditure (capex).

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Enterprise Telepresence and Videoconferencing Forecast

 If you're like many multinational business leaders today, then your company exists within a complex network of vendors, customers and other collaborators. This business ecosystem is as vital to you as your employees and intellectual property. Keeping it healthy helps you maintain and grow your market share, navigate challenging economic conditions, and explore new business opportunities.

In many commercial scenarios, conducting international business and staying in touch with all your key stakeholders requires regular face-to-face communications. But sometimes you can accomplish your personal interaction objectives without the need to travel to distant places.

Infonetics Research released its current Enterprise Telepresence and Video Conferencing report, which provides insight and analysis of dedicated videoconference infrastructure and endpoints -- which includes the latest immersive telepresence applications.

Collaborating in a Global Distributed Organization

"Communicating via video continues to be one of the top trends, as evidenced by strong growth in the enterprise video market. Businesses worldwide are looking for richer means of communications with their employees, partners, and customers, and enterprise videoconferencing and telepresence solutions are a natural fit," said Matthias Machowinski, directing analyst for enterprise networks and video at Infonetics Research.

According to the findings from their latest market study, Infonetics says they believe that the biggest winners in the enterprise communications market will be those who offer solutions that are multi-modal, visual (video-based), and support the collaboration requirements of globally distributed organizations.

 Highlights of the Infonetics market study include:

• Annual enterprise video conferencing and telepresence system revenue grew 18 percent in 2010 to $2.2 billion worldwide.
• Infonetics expects the enterprise video conferencing and telepresence market to more than double by 2015, when it will reach $5.0 billion.
• Due to their versatility, multi-purpose room systems account for the majority of enterprise video conferencing equipment.
• Immersive telepresence systems are expected to have the highest growth rates of all video conferencing equipment.
• Based upon their low cost and availability on PBXs, software-based endpoints out-ship hardware by 10:1
• The acquisition of Tandberg propelled Cisco to the top position – based on the overall enterprise video conferencing market, with 50 percent of revenue in 2010.
• Polycom maintains its second position for revenue, and leads for units shipped.

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Managed Service Enables Secure Delivery of Intellectual Property

In a global economy, professional services firms must differentiate themselves from their competition in increasingly creative ways. Rockwell Technology Group, a Grand Rapids, Mich.-based software development firm, serves customers across the U.S. Midwest and Canada, including manufacturers, insurance companies, and management services.

Because its customers are widespread, it needed to come up with a way to quickly and securely deliver software updates and patches for systems it had developed. As a way to save both time and money, it uses WebEx Workspace, a hosted extranet service, to post the results of its work for download by customers.

The alternative would be to burn the software onto a CD or DVD and either have it delivered by hand or shipped overnight. But by using WebEx Workspace, Rockwell garners several advantages.

Saving Time, Increasing Security
One advantage is that the software updates, which may be necessary to make a business process more efficient, are immediately available to customers. "As soon as our developers have new custom software ready for delivery, I can call the customer and say, 'download it and you're good to go,'" says Mark Laws, Rockwell Technology Group's chief operating officer. Rockwell doesn't have to send someone to the customer to install the software.

Rockwell's customers also appreciate the increased security. WebEx Workspace uses the Secure Sockets Layer (SSL) protocol to ensure protection during transmission, and Rockwell posts software updates in a password-protected folder accessible only to that customer.

Hosted Collaboration Brings Internal Advantages
Rockwell also uses the collaborative workspace internally as well, which helps the company update team members about customer projects.

It stores project-related documents in the hosted Document Manager; it uses the Discussion Forums to carry on impromptu online chats, which are then maintained for later access by other team members; and it maintains schedules and to-do lists using other Workspace capabilities.

Even though Rockwell could just as easily deploy collaborative software internally, it prefers to use WebEx Workspace because of its capacity and convenience. "We have millions of gigabytes stored on the WebEx Workspace," says Laws. "If one of our computers crashes, we don't have to worry about losing any data. We just go to another computer."

If you need to share sensitive information securely, and don't want to worry about maintaining an extensive infrastructure, asking a managed services provider to set up a collaborative workspace can help you focus on serving your customers more productively.

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