IT managers now happier to get spending

Information technology managers expect to increase their spending by 2.4 per cent in 2004, according to a survey released by Forrester Research. That's up from the 1.7 per cent rise projected six months ago.

The report is based on feedback from IT managers at 878 US companies with 1,000 or more employees. Companies that provide business services in areas such as transportation and construction, along with companies in the finance and insurance sectors, led other industries in year-over-year IT spending increases.

Sixty-one per cent of those surveyed said they'd be spending on portals; 56 per cent said they'd work on content management and 48 per cent said they'd invest in business intelligence software.

More than half the companies plan more investments in enterprise application integration this year. Companies are split on their choice of primary development platform, with 56 per cent choosing Microsoft's .Net and 44 per cent opting for J2EE from Sun.

About 38 per cent of companies are planning to upgrade at least one in four computers. Dell seems to be far ahead in the race for those buyers, with 57 per cent of companies preferring machines from the PC maker.

Thirty-one per cent of companies, mostly manufacturing and retail and wholesale companies, said they would increase RFID (radio frequency identification) deployments through the year. Additionally, 60 per cent of the surveyed companies said they will build wireless LANs (local area networks) during the next 12 months.