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Solution Providers to Vie for Tight IT Dollars

IT spending IT Budgets Holding Steady On average, IT professionals surveyed plan to invest $291,062 on IT products and services this year. Only 33% of respondents expect 2015 budgets to increase from 2014 levels. Top Drivers of IT Spending More than two-thirds (67%) of IT pros cite end-of-life support as the driving force behind new […]

Written By

Michael Vizard

Jan 30, 2015

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IT spending

IT Budgets Holding Steady

On average, IT professionals surveyed plan to invest $291,062 on IT products and services this year. Only 33% of respondents expect 2015 budgets to increase from 2014 levels.

Top Drivers of IT Spending

More than two-thirds (67%) of IT pros cite end-of-life support as the driving force behind new purchases. More than half of desktops and notebooks are more than 4 years old, and 20% are more than 7 years old.

The Looming Windows 2003 Deadline

Nearly two-thirds (65%) of companies have at least one instance of Windows Server 2003 running in their environment. The end-of-life deadline for Windows Server 2003 is July 14.

Hardware Still Dominates IT Spending

IT pros plan to spend 41% of their 2015 IT budget on hardware solutions, including new desktops, laptops, networking and server solutions. One-fifth (20%) will go to desktops, 19% to servers and 15% to laptops; 10% will be spent on networking, 8% on external storage and 7% on tablets/mobile.

Software Spending Remains Steady

IT professionals plan to spend 33% of their 2015 budget on software projects this year: 17% on operating systems, 16% on productivity apps, 14% on virtualization, 11% on backup/disaster recovery, 10% on databases, 9% on CRM/ERP and 8% on security.

New Software Investments

Of the new software investments planned for 2015, 24% of purchases will focus on virtualization and 23% will be investments in new operating systems to replace end-of-life systems. Backup/disaster recovery follows closely behind at 22%.

Online Backup and Recovery Leads to the Cloud

IT pros will spend 12% of their annual budgets on hosted/cloud-based projects in 2015. Of that, 18% will be for email hosting, 16% for Web hosting, 13% for online backup/recovery, 7% for application hosting and 6% for industry-specific apps.

Modest Gains in IT Headcount

Only a quarter (25%) of IT organization said they will increase IT department headcount this year. And those gains are expected to be relatively modest.

Managed Services Remain Flat

IT pros plan to spend 10% of their annual budgets on managed services this year; 19% of the allocated budget go toward IT services, 16% toward managed services consulting, 16% on connectivity/bandwidth, 14% on hosting, 10% on storage/backup/archiving, and 9% on email/collaboration.

Michael Vizard

Michael Vizard is a seasoned IT journalist, with nearly 30 years of experience writing and editing about enterprise IT issues. He is a writer for publications including Programmableweb, IT Business Edge, CIOinsight, Channel Insider and UBM Tech. He formerly was editorial director for Ziff-Davis Enterprise, where he launched the company’s custom content division, and has also served as editor in chief for CRN and InfoWorld. He also has held editorial positions at PC Week, Computerworld and Digital Review.

Solution Providers to Vie for Tight IT Dollars

Michael Vizard

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