Survey shows uptick in IT budget growth expectations

About 100 investment officers polled for the survey in the US, 50 in Europe

The expectations for growth in information technology (IT) budgets for 2013 have improved by 110 basis points since June 2013 to 4.3% in October, a survey conducted by Morgan Stanley showed.

 

As part of its quarterly survey, the brokerage firm polled 100 investment officers in the US and 50 in Europe.

 

“The rebound in European budget growth is particularly robust and coincides with improving macro indicators and our conversations with vendors / channel partners,” Morgan Stanley said in a report published this week. Expectations of IT budgets of European companies rose by .1% to 3.7%, amid recovering macro economic environment, Morgan Stanley said.

 

For yet another quarter, growth expectations for spending on software remained higher than other technology sub-sectors. Software spending growth expectations for 2013 rose to 4.3% in October from 3.1% three months ago.

 

Upcoming technologies such as enterprise resource planning, analytics, cloud computing and security are among the top priorities for IT investments by companies, the survey showed. Many industry observers have said that these technologies, which are currently at a nascent stage of adoption, are likely to become mainstream in the coming years.

 

“Taking a 'bottoms up' perspective, ERP rose to top the list of IT priorities, with analytics, cloud computing, and security remaining high on the list. This compares to three months ago, when security, analytics, and networking were the top three priorities,” Morgan Stanley said.