Tough choices ahead for cash-strapped IT departments in 2015

Spiceworks has announced the results of a new survey examining the 2015 spending priorities of IT professionals in North America and EMEA as well as their view on growth within their organi s ations. On average, IT professionals surveyed plan to invest £192,820 on IT products and services this year. Only 33 per cent of respondents expect budgets to increase over 201 5 and even fewer, 25 per cent, say their organi s ations will increase IT department headcount this year. Despite strained resources, 2015 will be the year many IT professionals refresh aging hardware and software across their organi s ations as “end of life” issues become a reality for IT departments.

“Over the years, IT professionals have become accustomed to doing more with less and 2015 will be no exception,” said Sanjay Castelino, VP of Marketing at Spiceworks. “Aging PC hardware and the impending countdown to Windows Server 2003 end of life will force IT professionals to get creative this year when it comes to spending the resources they do have and choosing the right technology investments that will help increase employee productivity and drive their organizations forward.”

Spiceworks’ “ 2015 IT Budget Report ” found that software e nd of life is a top reason companies plan to spend on new IT hardware, software, and services in 2015 with 67 per cent of IT professionals citing this issue as the driving force behind new purchases. Over 50 per cent of desktops and laptops in the Spiceworks network are more than four years old, and 20 per cent are more than seven years old.

Perhaps an even bigger hurdle for IT departments will be the end of life and recommended migration deadline for Windows Server 2003 on July 14, 2015. Sixty-five per cent of companies in the Spiceworks network have at least one instance of Windows Server 2003 running in their environment, meaning a majority of IT professionals will be racing to migrate in advance of Microsoft’s deadline. Additional highlights from the survey include:

IT professionals prioriti s e hardware investments in 2015
- IT professionals plan to spend 41 per cent of their 2015 IT budget on hardware solutions including new desktops, laptops, networking and server solutions.
- IT professionals will spend an average of 20 per cent of their hardware budgets on desktops, 19 per cent on servers and 15 per cent on laptops. Additionally, 10 per cent will be spent on networking, eight per cent on external storage and seven per cent on tablets/mobile.

Software investments fall closely behind hardware in terms of priority
- IT professionals plan to spend 33 per cent of their 2015 budget on software projects this year.
- IT professionals will spend an average of 17 per cent of their software budgets on operating systems, 16 per cent on productivity solutions, 14 per cent on virtuali s ation, 11 per cent on backup/disaster recovery, 10 per cent on databases, nine per cent on CRM/ERP, and eight per cent on security.
- Of the new software investments planned for 2015, 24 per cent of purchases will focus on virtuali s ation and 23 per cent will be investments in new operating systems to replace end of life systems. Backup/disaster recovery follows closely behind at 22 per cent. Not surprisingly, most software spending in 2015 will be in recurring investments.

Online backup and recovery leads new cloud purchases
- IT professionals will spend 12 per cent of their annual budgets on hosted/cloud-based projects in 2015. Of that, 18 per cent will be spent on email hosting, 16 per cent on web hosting, 13 per cent on online backup/recovery, seven per cent on application hosting, and six per cent on industry-specific applications.
- Among those planning to deploy new cloud-based solutions, online backup/recovery leads the pack followed closely by productivity solutions.

Managed services see fair portion of budget dollars
- IT professionals plan to spend 10 per cent of their annual budgets on managed services this year.
- Nineteen per cent of the allocated budget in this area will be spent on IT services, 16 per cent on managed services consulting, 16 per cent on connectivity/bandwidth, 14 per cent on hosting, 10 per cent on storage/backup/archiving, and nine per cent on email/collaboration.
- Among those planning to use a new managed service, storage/backup/archiving leads the way with 14 per cent of overall purchases. The majority of recurring managed services investments will be in connectivity/bandwidth.