AMR Research: Reason for optimism
AMR Research surveyed 500 mid-tier and enterprise-size companies to get a perspective on IT spending and company IT budgets. It found that the IT budget averages 3 percent of a company's total revenue. It further broke it down by a number of market segments and found that the services industries spend an average of 5 percent of their revenue, while manufacturers budget only 2.4 percent of their revenue for IT.
AMR found perhaps one of the best reasons for optimism in the IT community: "Companies foresee increasing their budget 2 percent in 2004." It attributes this positive outlook to two factors: the corporate profit pictures continue to improve and needed spending for IT has been put off for a few years.
Other noteworthy results from the survey focused on what areas IT organisations are targeting for next year:
IDC: Pent-up demand for infrastructure
IDC also surveyed 500 end-user organisations and its findings were very much in line with the other analyst firms: a mixture of good news with words of caution.
The good news from IDC's report is that it sees that "North American companies are recording the first gradual increases in overall IT spending since the end of 2000." However, it warns that, "this growth remains heavily dependent on economic confidence and is inhibited by a persistent atmosphere of caution and hesitancy."
IDC reports that its survey also sees an increased focus on infrastructure upgrades.
Note: To read the complete text of these and dozens of other views on IT spending, visit the Analyst Views site.
