IT Spending on (Slight) Rise, Mobile Tops the List

More IT leaders plan to invest more in technology this year than they did in 2012, according to a recent Tech Poll/Tech Priorities survey conducted by CIO Research. But, before you get too excited, it’s only a few more IT executives planning to spend and it’s only a little more money.

Forty-eight percent of CIOs surveyed expect to spend more this year, up slightly from the 46 percent who planned to spend more at this time last year. The average increase expected is 5.9 percent (up from 4.4 percent a year ago).

Not surprisingly, given the rush to adopt BYOD policies, mobile spending tops the list with 59 percent of respondents reporting that they plan to increase spending in that area. Forty-four percent of the CIOs surveyed say that they already have smartphones in production at the business unit, division or enterprise level. And 22 percent report they are currently piloting tablets.

Business intelligence and analytics are a close second priority in terms of IT investment, just slightly behind mobile, with 56 percent of IT executives saying they will increase spending in that category. Hardware infrastructure upgrades (specifically tablets) came in at 51 percent.

Cloud technologies (public, private and apps) also figure prominently in IT spending forecasts with slightly less than half of respondents planning to invest in cloud technology and services. CIOs in small and midsize businesses (i.e., those with fewer than 1,000 employees) are significantly more likely than their counterparts at larger companies to increase spending on public cloud services (56 percent, versus 38 percent).

Rounding out the top investment areas are security technologies such as identity management, data loss prevention and encryption.

Eyeing the IT Future

What areas are IT executives most actively researching? Business process management, cloud computing services (external/public) and software-as-a-Service /cloud apps are on the radar of 31 percent of respondents, followed closely by software-defined networking (30 percent) and social media/collaboration tools (29 percent).

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Dan Muse is executive editor of CIO.com. Follow him on Twitter @dmuse. Follow everything from CIO.com on Twitter @CIOonline, on Facebook, and on Google +.