Gartner: Worldwide IT spending to break $3.8tn this year

Worldwide spending on IT products and services will grow by 4.1 percent this year to roughly US$3.8 trillion, according to new forecast figures released by analyst firm Gartner.

Cuts in U.S. government spending and the ongoing debt crisis in Cyprus have caused “the fragile business and consumer sentiment throughout much of the world” to persist, Gartner analyst Richard Gordon said in a statement released Thursday. “However, the new shocks are expected to be short-lived, and while they may cause some pauses in discretionary spending along the way, strategic IT initiatives will continue.”

Telecom services spending, the largest segment tracked by Gartner’s forecast, will rise 2 percent this year to $1.69 trillion after experiencing a 0.4 percent drop in growth last year. Declining voice-related revenue will be offset by mobile data services spending, according to Gartner.

Enterprise software revenues will also see an uptick this year, rising 6.4 percent to $297 billion, compared to a 3.5 percent growth rate in 2012.

While that growth rate is the same as predicted in a previous Gartner report, it “belies significant changes at a market level,” according to the forecast.

Database, data integration and supply chain software will make up for softer growth in IT operations and operating systems products, Gartner said.

IT services spending will grow 4.5 percent to $918 billion in 2013, while data centre systems spending is set to jump 3.7 percent to $146 billion.

Devices spending will be $718 billion this year, rising 7.9 percent, according to Gartner.