Australia’s software spending outlook for next year remains higher than the regional average despite the pressures of the economic downturn, according to new research from Gartner.
Gartner research director for Software in Asia-Pacific, Yanna Dharmasthira, said the average spending increase anticipated by local companies in 2010 was 4.82 per cent. She claimed this indicated Australian organisations were cautiously optimistic.
The findings are part of the analyst firm’s latest Software Base Budget, Asia Pacific, 2009-2010 user survey conducted between April-May 2009. Only 8.93 per cent of Australian respondents expected a decrease in their 2010 software budgets, while 60.71 per cent were predicting levels to remain stable year-on-year.
“Compared to our previous survey for software budgets in 2008, Australian respondents at that time did not show a significant change to the numbers reflected today. This confirms the Australian market as mature and more stable,” Dharmasthira said.
Australia’s increase is higher than the Asia-Pacific average of 4.4 per cent, which in turn beat all other regions thanks to robust Indian and Singaporean expectations.
Indian IT departments expect software budgets to rise by 9.7 per cent, while Singapore organisations are the second-most positive at 6.8 per cent. Chinese companies are set to boost software spending by 4.2 per cent. Malaysian companies are the most pessimistic, predicting a cut of 0.8 per cent.
The results reflect the experiences of companies like Zap Technology, which recently won a six-figure deal in Singapore for software. Australian companies have also shown more hardware confidence, with server numbers bucking the global trend.
