Worldwide IT spending is projected to increase to $3.8 trillion this year, according to the 2013 Gartner IT spending forecast. This is up 4.1% from $3.6 trillion in 2012.
The largest segment of this is the $1 688 billion predicted to be spent on telecoms services, which remains roughly flat at an increase of only 2%. However, spending on voice services is diminishing, balanced by increased spending on mobile data.
Likewise, the 6.4% increase expected in enterprise software spending remains unchanged from previous forecasts, but there is a great deal of internal change, with lower growth in IT operations management and operating systems software balanced by the stronger growth expected for database management systems, data integration tools and supply chain management.
Steady growth in IT spending is "a calm ocean that hides turbulent currents beneath", according to John Lovelock, research VP at Gartner. "The nexus of forces - social, mobile, cloud and information - is reshaping spending patterns across all of the IT sectors that Gartner forecasts.
"Consumers and businesses will continue to purchase a mix of IT products and services; nothing is going away completely. However, the ratio of this mix is changing dramatically and there are clear winners and losers over the next three to five years, as we see more of a transition from PCs to mobile phones, from servers to storage, from licensed software to cloud, or the shift in voice and data connections from fixed to mobile," says Lovelock.
While the amount spent on PCs remains flat, and printer sales have seen a modest decline, the increasing spending on premium mobile phones will see an upward trend in the devices sector of 7.9%, up from 6.3% in the previous Gartner forecast.
The trend in computing is indisputably towards mobility, as worldwide tablet PC shipments will overtake desktop PCs this year and portable PCs next year, according to the latest Smart Connected Device Tracker report from the International Data Corporation (IDC). The report detailed growth of 78.4% in shipments of tablets in 2012, and a 4.1% and 3.4% decline in desktop and portable PCs, respectively.
This "nexus of forces" will contribute to a drastic restructuring of the IT services market, according to Gartner's top predictions for IT in 2013 and beyond. Market consolidation is forecast to displace up to 20% of the top 100 IT service providers by 2014, as solutions such as low-cost cloud services reduce the need for outsourcing.
"The priorities of CEOs must be dealt with by CIOs who exist in a still-turbulent economy and increasingly uncertain technology future," said Daryl Plummer, managing VP and Gartner fellow. "As the world of IT moves forward, it is finding that it must co-ordinate activities in a much wider scope than it once controlled, and as a result, a loss of control echoes through several predictions we are making."
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