key takeaways what budgetary beasts will it pros battle in ... · campﬁre stories of a world...

8/4/2016 2016 Latest Trends in IT & Technology Adoption

http://www.spicy/marketing/state-of-it/report/ 1/23

Key TakeawaysWhat budgetary beasts will IT pros battle in 2016? Here are a fewkey findings:

1 Despite rising average annual company revenue, IT budgets remain relativelyflat.

2 IT pros don’t expect their IT staff to increase in 2016, which means they’llneed to keep doing more… with less.

3 Security attacks are rising, but budgets aren't. 59% of IT pros say theircompanies don't invest enough in security.

4 Technology end-of-life (EOL) is expected to strongly influence investment in2016.



>> IT budgets remain fairly flat, even though average annual

revenue is higher than last year.

IT Budget BarriersMoney makes the world go 'round, especially the world of IT. Unfortunately,IT pros and tech marketers in 2016 will have some fearsome financial foesto face.



Curse of the IT SpendIT budgets... are barely budging over the coming year. Global planned spending is expectedto increase by about $2,000 year over year. And while North American IT pros will see aslight lift in their 2016 budgets, the money monsters are after EMEA IT pros—they'll havevirtually no budget increase next year.

“"A lot of the time, management's number one priority is the revenuestream. So I show them why if the issue isn't resolved, it will mean a lossof revenue in one way or another."

Colton Howard, IT Manager

”Planned spending on IT hardware, software, and services

$293,094 $291,062

2016 2015

Total$0

$50,000

$100,000

$150,000

$200,000

$250,000

$300,000

$350,000



Total IT budget expected to change from 2015 to 2016

11%10%42%38%

Increase No change Decrease Don't know

Revenue GrowingThough IT spending is relatively flat, more than half (56%) of IT pros surveyed expect their company'sannual revenue to continue increasing in 2016. What's the disconnect?Management is laser-focused on keeping costs low, but doesn't quite get IT's importance to thecompany... until something breaks.

Revenue change from 2015 to 2016

12%10%22%56%




Staffing StrainedAlmost 60% of IT pros surveyed don't expect their IT staff to increase in 2016 (cue the Wilhelm Scream).This means they'll need to continue making IT work... minus the extra hands.

Overall expected change in IT staff for 2016

3%4%59%34%




Allocation of Budget in 2016How will IT pros divvy up the dollars? Their top priorities are hardware and software, although spendingfor hosted/cloud-based and managed service projects is slated to increase slightly over 2015.Also, despite the fact that Windows 10 is a free upgrade for most, IT pros still plan to spend some moneyon hardware as part of their OS rollout.

Overall budget allocation

37%

31%

13% 14%

5%

41%

33%

10% 12%

3%

2016 2015

Hardware projects Software projects Managed service

projects

Hosted/cloud‑

based projects

Don't know



Top hardware investments on average by year (Percentage of hardware budget)

21%19%

16%

10%

6% 6%

20% 19%

15%

10%8% 7%

2016 2015

Desktops Servers Laptops Networking External

storage

Tablet/Mobile

Surprised that desktops are still in the lead—even expected to creep ahead more in 2016? Despitecampfire stories of a world without desktops, they aren’t going anywhere this year. Still, IT pros predictdesktops will eventually be scared off by The Rise of the Mobile Empire.

Top software investments on average by year (Percentage of software budget)

15% 15% 15%

10% 10% 10% 9%

14%17% 16%

9%11% 10%

8%

2016 2015

Virtualization OS Productivity CRM/ERP Backup/DR Database Security



Top managed services investments on average by year (Percentage of managed services budget)

14% 13% 13%

10%

5% 4%

19%

16%14%

16%

10% 9%

3%5%

2016 2015

IT se

rvice

s

Conne

ctivit

y / b…

Hostin

g

Consu

lting

Storag

e / ba

cku…

Email

/ co

llabo

r…

Commun

icatio

n

Cellula

r

Top hosted/cloud-based investments on average by year (Percentage of hosted/cloud-basedbudget)

10% 8%6%

4% 4% 4% 4%

18%16%

13%

7% 5% 4% 2%5% 6%

2016 2015

Email

…

Web ho

sting

Online

back

up/re

cove

ry

Produ

ctivit

y solu

tions

Applic

ation

hosti

ng

Infras

tructu

re

Hosted

VoIP

Sales

supp

ort (C

RM)

Conten

t filte

ring

Indus

try‑s

pecifi

c app

s

Purchase Drivers



>> What's keeping IT buyers up at night? Security and OSes top

the list.

So what drives IT pros to buy? The numbers don't lie—like last year, technology EOL and company

growth/additional needs top the list. New tech features are the least compelling, with only a quarter of IT

pros citing these as drivers for new tech purchases.

This speaks to the motto of many companies: "If it ain't broke, don't fix it."

What typically prompts your organization to purchase new hardware, software and/orservices?

67%57%

33%25%

67%

56% 57%

34%

2016 2015

End of

life

Growth

/ add

iti…

Upgrad

es / r

efr…

End‑us

er nee

d

Projec

t need

Budget

availa

bility

Software

/ app

li…

New te

chnolo

gy…

Trending Topics

Things that go bump in the server room? Security will be the stuff of techie

bad dreams. On the brighter side, it ’s a big year for OS upgrades.



Security: Be Afraid, Be Very AfraidOnly half of surveyed IT pros believe their organization's data is adequately protected and consider IT

security a top priority for 2016. Almost 60% also believe their organization is not adequately investing in

IT security.

“"It's still true that even in a high tech sector, your weakest point is yourusers. Ensure that all employees are being careful (hire a company fullof sysadmins! :D) or TRAIN them to be better."

Lisa Lyons, Network/Systems Admin

”Security perceptions (Percentage of those who selected agree or strongly agree)

48% 51%59% 62%

74%

Our data/IT assets

aren't adequately

protected

IT security isn't a

top priority for us

in 2016

We don't

adequately invest

in IT security

We don't conduct

regular security

audits

Newsworthy

breaches haven't

led us to change IT

security practices



About three-quarters of surveyed IT pros consider their organizations at risk for technology, IT security,and man-made disasters or incidents. IT spend on security hardware, software, and services will remainflat year over year with IT professionals planning to allocate 6% of their total budget to security.

Plus, many organizations aren't conducting regular security audits or updating security practices to helpprotect against worldwide increase in security breaches. In other words, there's still a lot of room forimprovement when it comes to securing IT environments from the threats lurking in the shadows,especially as news of hacks haunt the headlines.

Disaster risk perceptions (Percentage of those who selected moderate to high risk)

73% 73% 72%

40%

30%

Technology

disasters/incidents

IT security

disasters/incidents

Man‑made

disasters/incidents

Natural

disasters/incidents

Other

disasters/incidents



OS News: Night of the Living Dead OSes

Spiceworks' exclusive network stats show that Microsoft Windows 7 is still the most adopted OS,

followed by Windows XP—a dead OS walking (and not a great one to have around) when it comes to

security. Of the most popular OSes, Windows 8 has the lowest penetration rate. So, what's the exact OS

usage breakdown we're seeing on the Spiceworks network?

Percentage of companies within the Spiceworks network using the following client OSes (as of

July 2014 to July 2015)

93%

66%

16%

90%72%

18%

2015 2014

Windows 7 Windows XP Windows 8

Microsoft Windows Server 2003 had its end-of-service in April 2015, so it’s not shocking that fewer IT

pros are using it. (Though it’s still present in 60% of companies.) With that, Spiceworks is seeing a higher

network penetration rate for Windows Server 2012/2012 R2 than in the past—as predicted.



Percentage of companies within the Spiceworks network using the following server OSes

60%44%

68%

27%

2015 2014

Windows Server 2003 Windows Server 2012/2012 R2

OS News: Keeping the Boogeymen at Bay

According to the survey, the migration trends will continue: IT pros say their top OS initiatives for 2016

are upgrading to Windows 10 and migrating from Windows Server 2003. In addition, surveyed IT pros

who've allocated budget to OS upgrades do expect to upgrade older hardware during these OS projects.

What can we say? It seems IT pros are still buying hardware... even when the OS is free.

“"We're looking at upgrading our machines to a newer OS. While

migrating to Windows 10, we're swapping out the drives on any newbuild/rebuild to SSDs."

Charlie Tank, Network/Sys Admin

”



Top OS projects IT pros plan to spend budget on (Asked of those planning to allocate 2016 software

budget to OS)

47%

32%

12%

Windows 10

Windows Server 2003 migration

SQL Server 2005 migration

Top planned hardware purchases as part of an OS project (Asked of those who know what OS projects

will get budget)

51%

51%

47%

25%

22%

Servers

Desktops

Laptops

Storage

Tablets/smartphones



>> EOL will be a top reason IT pros make new purchases. (So

things will still go cha-ching in the night...)

Future of IT

Look into our crystal ball as we

delve into the popularity of

different tech trends, from

server virtualization to BYOD to

advanced security to [insert

almost anything]-as-a-service...

So, what lies ahead for IT?



Not-so-Terrifying IT Tech Trends

More than three-quarters of survey respondents currently use server virtualization—significantly more

than those supporting mobility and BYOD. But only a third are using advanced solutions despite

increased security attacks (consider yourself warned!)

That said, IT pros are gearing up for a... threatening year. Almost a quarter plan to invest in advanced

security in 2016. Other predicted areas of high growth? Application virtualization/hosted shared desktop,

VDI, and various shapes of cloud such as SaaS, IaaS, and PaaS.

Adoption of technology trends

9%

12%

21%

10%

11%

12%

5%

3%

4%

3%

3%

76%

45%

34%

34%

28%

18%

11%

8%

6%

6%

6%

Currently use Planning to use

Server Virtualization

Mobility/BYOD

Advanced Security Solutions

Software as a Service (SaaS)

Application Virtualization/HostedShared Desktop

Virtual Desktop Infrastructure(VDI)

Infrastructure as a Service (IaaS)

Platform as a Service (PaaS)

Software‑defined Data Center(SDDC)

Desktop as a Service (DaaS)

Software‑defined Network (SDN)



Importance of IT Initiatives to BusinessSecurity solutions, while considered pretty important to current business practices, are expected to gettop billing in the future. This indicates IT pros may start using more funds to ward off potential securityissues.

Importance of IT solutions/services to current and future business practices (Percentage ofthose who selected very to extremely important)

78%

70%

62%

61%

57%

65%

43%

39%

32%

73%

72%

63%

63%

59%

58%

29%

28%

18%

Important now Important in the future

Security

Networking

Storage

Software

Hardware

Virtualization

Cloud‑based or hosted services

Training & development

Mobility/BYOD



IT's Not All Doom & GloomCompany revenues should get a boost in 2016, but IT budgets will remain flat. The good news for tech

vendors: IT departments will still be shelling out bucks on IT in the coming year. In fact, OS migrations

away from Windows Server 2003 and upgrades to Windows 10 will drive some purchases of new servers

and PCs.

In addition, with only half of IT departments feeling adequately protected from security threats, IT pros

are definitely thinking long and hard about choosing the right security products for their organizations—

and budgets.

For IT departments that can't spend big right now, they'll need to look for ways to spend smart by

identifying clever ways to save money while still meeting business needs. In other words, things will still

go cha-ching in the night...



>> From North America (NA) to Europe, the Middle East, and Africa

(EMEA), these IT pros span company size, job title, and industry.

ProfileWho are these IT pros making up the State of IT? Take a peek...



Number of survey respondents

59%

41%

NA EMEA

Top industries represented

13%

11%10%

8%7% 7%

5% 5%4%

Manufa

…

IT serv

ices

Healthcare

Education

Nonpro

fit

Reta

il/wholesa

le

Fin

ancial Serv

ices

Govern

ment

Constru

ction



Company sizes represented

16%

12%

20%24%

11%8%

4% 4%

1‑19

em…

20‑4

9 emplo

yees

50‑9

9 emplo

yees

100‑

249 e

mploye

es

250‑

499 e

mploye

es

500‑

999 e

mploye

es

1,000

‑2,49

9 emplo

yees

2,500

+ emplo

yees

Top titles represented

34%

29%

12%

7% 6%

Network/SystemAdministrator

IT Manager IT Director Owner/CEO/Presid… Help DeskTechnician



About SpiceworksSpiceworks is the professional network that’s revolutionizing the ITeconomy. We provide millions of IT pros with the tools, content, andcommunity they need to get their jobs done. Those users have attractedthe attention of thousands of technology brands who use Spiceworks toreach IT professionals during their workday. Together, we’ve created theworld’s most trusted and vibrant IT marketplace.

ABOUT SPICEWORKS VOICE OF IT ®

The Spiceworks Voice of IT market insights program publishes statistics, trends, and opinions on the ITindustry. We’re pioneering a new, fresh approach to IT data by combining rich social insights from thenetwork with one-of-a-kind usage statistics on the technologies that keep businesses running today.More than 620,000 IT professionals in over 100 countries have joined the program to share informationand feedback on the tech issues important to them.

Follow Spiceworks on Twitter and connect with Spiceworks on Facebook.

For more information visit: www.spiceworks.com

For other Spiceworks Voice of IT reports visit: www.spiceworks.com/marketing/resources/

This report contains information of fact relating to parties other than Spiceworks. Although the information has been

obtained from, and is based on sources that Spiceworks believes to be reliable, Spiceworks does not guarantee the accuracy,

and any such information might be incomplete or condensed. Any estimates included in this report constitute Spiceworks’

judgment as of the date of compilation, and are subject to change without notice. This report is for information purposes only.

All responsibility for any interpretations or actions based on the information or commentary contained within this report lie

solely with the recipient. All rights reserved. 2015.

key takeaways what budgetary beasts will it pros battle in ... · campﬁre stories of a world...

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