Driven by the growing adoption of remote/hybrid working model and government support for large-scale digitalization of the economy, more than 60% of the enterprises* in Australia have increased their ICT budgets in 2022 with IT security, cloud and digital transformation proving to be the top investment priority areas, reveals GlobalData, a leading data and analytics company.
According to GlobalData’s “Australia Enterprise ICT Investment Trends Report,” which is based on the company’s recent ICT customer insight survey*, about 55% respondents who are the key IT decision makers in enterprises covered have claimed that there has been a slight (1% to 6%) increase in their enterprise ICT budget for 2022 compared to 2021 while another 12.5% have claimed there has been a significant (greater than 6%) increase in the same.
Saurabh Daga, Technology Analyst at GlobalData, says: “The positive outlook for the enterprise ICT spending in Australia can be attributed to the continuation of remote and hybrid working environment, increased cloud migration, and digitalization of key processes amidst the new business requirements necessitated by the COVID-19 disruptions. Furthermore, various government initiatives to establish Australia as a digital economy as codified in the government’s ‘Digital Economy Strategy’ are compelling businesses to prioritize technology spending.”
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The report, which analyses enterprise investment priorities across 30+ IT solution areas, pinpoints IT security as one of the top investment areas for 2022. Instances of cyber-attacks on businesses in Australia, including the the most recent ransomware attack on JBS Foods, are driving the enterprises in Australia to strengthen their IT security infrastructure.
Daga explains: “This is validated in the GlobalData’s survey, where more than 70% of the respondents have claimed that their enterprise software, budget allocation towards IT security has increased in 2022 compared with 2021, and more than 60% claimed that their individual enterprise hardware and services allocation towards security has increased in 2022 compared to 2021”.
Remote and hybrid work arrangements, which continue to remain popular among the enterprises across the country, will also stimulate investments in communication & collaboration solutions and cloud computing over the next two years. For instance, more than 75% respondents in GlobalData’s survey have claimed that their enterprises are prioritizing their ICT investment in video conferencing services for investment in the next two years.
Daga concludes: “A good percentage of enterprises in Australia are using disruptive technologies for digital transformation as indicated by the survey results, where more than 60% of the respondents confirm that their enterprise ICT budget allocation for disruptive technologies has increased in 2022 over 2021 with artificial intelligence and edge computing proving to be the most popular investment areas.”
*ICT Customer Insight Survey was undertaken between May and June 2022. The survey respondents include senior executives involved in IT decision making in enterprises cutting across several verticals and geographies.
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