Асоціація підприємств інформаційних технологій України

Egham, UK, 17 February, 2009 – The combined printer, copier and multifunctional product (MFP) shipments market in Europe, Middle East and Africa (EMEA) totalled 48.2 million units, a decline of 8.4 per cent over 2007 (see Table 1), according to Gartner, Inc.

“The fourth quarter of 2008 was a pivot point for the world economy, creating a very challenging selling environment for all printer, copier and MFP hardware and software providers. The rapidly deteriorating economic environment is forcing technology providers to look at their business models and make significant adjustments,” said Tosh Prabhakar, senior research analyst at Gartner.

Gartner said buyers reduced printer and MFP spending in light of low confidence in the market. Sales of consumer devices were down 9 per cent in 2008. In addition, businesses delayed product upgrades and/or cancelled investment in new office devices as budgets and cost containment policies became a priority.

Table 1

EMEA Printer, Copier and MFP Unit Shipments, 2008 (thousands)

Source: Gartner (February 2009)

Analysts Examine the Next Generation of CRM Technologies at Gartner Customer Relationship Management Summit 2009, 3-4 March, in London

Egham, UK, 29 January, 2009 — According to a recent survey from Gartner, Inc more than three quarters of respondents in Europe said they are planning to enhance their investments in CRM initiatives in 2009. These projects will focus on improving customer retention and increasing wallet share.

Gartner surveyed nearly 90 European business and IT leaders who influenced the CRM strategy in their organisation in the third quarter of 2008 and carried out a follow up poll in December.

“The responses to this later survey indicated that, as expected, some budgets for CRM initiatives were negatively impacted, but, the latest survey results showed that their earlier budget allocations for CRM initiatives largely remained in place,” said Chris Pang, principal research analyst at Gartner. “It was clear that many projects such as implementation of direct marketing tools, customer analytics, and customer service and support capabilities are too strategically or tactically important to be suddenly abandoned.”

Gartner estimates that CRM spending in 2009 will not decline as dramatically as it did after 2000, but growth will be more moderate than in previous years. It forecasts that the European CRM software market will reach $3.5 billion (€2.4billion) in 2009, an increase of 4 per cent from 2008.

The survey respondents also reported that their primary objectives for their CRM programmes were first, to enhance cross-selling or upselling of products and services, second to increase customer satisfaction and third to increase sales revenue. “These objectives take on added importance in a downturn because the cost and effort needed to sell to existing customers is often less than that for acquiring new ones,” said Mr Pang.

Today, IBM (NYSE: IBM) announced it is working with six universities to leverage IBM Blue Cloud solutions to speed up projects and research initiatives that were once constrained by time, limited or unavailable resources, or overloaded IT systems.

• The Qatar Cloud Computing Initiative, driven by three universities, will open its cloud infrastructure to local businesses and industries to test applications and complete various projects, including seismic modeling and the exploration for oil and gas.
• Another university, the University of Pretoria, is using cloud computing to test the development of drugs to slow the progression of serious illnesses in Africa.
• In addition, IBM is also working with The Higher Education Alliance for Leadership Through Health (HEALTH Alliance) in East Africa and Kyushu University in Fukuoka, Japan to use cloud computing.

Carnegie Mellon University in Qatar, Qatar University, Texas A&M University at Qatar

One of the first projects to bring cloud computing to the Middle East, the Qatar Cloud Computing Initiative, is operational and initially located at Carnegie Mellon University in Qatar. Carnegie Mellon University in Qatar, Qatar University, and Texas A&M University at Qatar will collaborate on this environment, along with a community of industry experts, researchers and clients, to develop a cloud solution to help solve industry problems.

STAMFORD, Conn., January 14, 2009 — As organisations face a challenging economic environment, IT spending budgets will be essentially flat with a planned increase of 0.16 per cent in 2009, according to results from the 2009 CIO survey by Gartner Executive Programs (EXP).

The worldwide survey of 1,527 CIOs was conducted by Gartner EXP from 15 September to 15 December 2008 and represents CIO budget plans reported at that time. Flat IT budgets were found across organisations in North America and Europe, with slight increases in Latin America and a slight decrease in Asia/Pacific.

The Gartner EXP CIO report "Meeting the Challenge: The 2009 CIO Agenda" represents the most comprehensive examination of business priorities and CIO strategies. The CIOs surveyed represent more than $138 billion in corporate and public-sector IT spending, encompassing 1,527 organisations across 48 countries and 30 industries.

"In 2009, executives face challenging global economic conditions that have not existed for more than 50 years," said Mark McDonald, group vice president and head of research for Gartner EXP. "This environment is reflected in IT budgets, priorities and strategies as one third of CIOs reported no change in their budget from 2008, while 46 per cent reported a slight increase, and 21 per cent reported a cut in IT budgets."

"All CIOs will face the need to restructure their budgets, cutting in some areas and investing in others, including those reporting no change in their overall spending level," Mr McDonald said.

STAMFORD, Conn., 14 January, 2009 — In the fourth quarter of 2008, the worldwide PC industry suffered its worst growth rate since 2002 as worldwide shipments totalled 78.1 million units, a 1.1 per cent increase from the fourth quarter of 2007, according to preliminary results by Gartner, Inc.

“The United States experienced steeper than expected shipment declines due to the recession. The Europe, Middle East and Africa (EMEA) region was also affected by the economic slow down across key countries,” said Mika Kitagawa, principal analyst for Gartner's Client Computing Markets group. “Asia/Pacific recorded the worst shipment growth since Gartner started its PC statistics research. Latin America met expectations, but its growth was much lower than in the past.”

The growth driver for the 2008 holiday PC season was the mini-notebook segment. With more vendors offering creative sales promotions, the mini-notebook segment outpaced overall mobile PC growth. However, PC revenue experienced a record decline. Steep average selling price (ASP) declines, as well as robust growth of low-priced systems, including mini-notebooks, contributed to this drop.

Hewlett-Packard (HP) managed to grow above the worldwide average in the fourth quarter of 2008 (see Table 1), however its year-on-year growth was its lowest since its merger with Compaq in 2003. HP did well in EMEA by aggressively promoting the mini-notebook segment, but it was impacted by sales in the US market.

Table 1
Preliminary Worldwide PC Vendor Unit Shipment Estimates for 4Q08 (Thousands of Units)

Egham, UK, 12 January, 2009 — Enterprise content management (ECM) can bring business process efficiencies and help the environment at the same time by reducing paper-based processes and the inherent latencies and costs, according to Gartner, Inc. Gartner has examined six areas in which organisations can develop strategies to become more agile and efficient while reducing the environmental impact of the business.

“The 1980’s notion of a paperless office was about how technology could bring efficiency and change work styles,” said Mark Gilbert, research vice president at Gartner. “Organisations are realising that process improvements and the move away from paper to electronic processes can also bring green benefits, such as energy savings from paper production, distribution, usage and disposition, and transit through the postal system.”

Gartner has examined six areas that help companies identify processes that can be modified to reduce harmful effects on the environment, while becoming more efficient:

1- Overcome information capture inefficiencies

Analyse how you capture information from customers, prospects and suppliers: Make an audit of the methods used by various functions to collect and route data, as well as serve up content. This will expose processes in which e-forms could be integrated to reduce the need to create a paper document, and also to reduce inefficient or redundant communications.

Review of experiences in select countries (Vietnam, Russia, and Jordan)

In many countries Information Technology (IT) Parks, which are also referred to as Techno Parks, Cyber Parks and Science Parks, have been established to facilitate the development of IT industries that foster new business development and technological innovation by leveraging synergies within a cluster environment. Given the potential complexity of these projects and scope of required investments, the growing interest of governments in developing and transition economies in designing and promoting such projects, and their needs for policy advice and financial support from the donor community, there is a pressing need for a synthesis of best practices and lessons learned both from success and failure.

To address this need, infoDev, in cooperation with the World Bank Group, commissioned a global best practice study on IT Parks. The study identifies five countries, from which a total of six IT Parks were selected to get a representative sample covering both (i) successfull and not-so-successful IT parks, and (ii) IT goods as well as IT and BPO (Business Process Outsourcing) services. The study analysis has been based on the CLIP framework: Capital, Linkages, Infrastructure, People

For downloading see http://www.infodev.org/en/Publication.557.html

See also http://www.infodev.org/en/Project.82.html

Egham, UK, January 6, 2009 — Gartner, Inc today presented its 10 ‘CIO resolutions for 2009’ designed to help CIOs excel and deliver better personal and team outcomes beyond their core IT agenda.

“The unfolding economic crisis of late 2008 has created a more challenging situation than many businesses and most CIOs have ever experienced,” said Mark Raskino, vice president and Fellow at Gartner. “They face a daunting and uncertain year ahead. Many CIOs have already been instructed to operate with lower budgets and many more expect such instructions. Chief executives need to cut short- term costs very quickly to cope with volatile market sentiment in many industries and countries, but without damaging recovery growth prospects.”

In 2009, most CEOs and businesses will put themselves on a survival path while they reinvest for strategic recovery in 2010 and beyond. “In time of a recession, organisations have more time for introspection that identifies what the deep needs are and also creates demand on what IT can do,” said John Mahoney, vice president and distinguished analyst at Gartner. “It brings the opportunity for businesses to exploit the technology they currently have to create something new.”

Gartner’s 10 CIO resolutions for 2009 are grouped into four strategic themes: