NEW YORK, Dec. 5, 2013 /PRNewswire/ -- Reportlinker.com announces that a new market research report is available in its catalogue:

ICT budget and staffing trends in Utilities - Enterprise ICT investment plans
http://www.reportlinker.com/p01906915/ICT-budget-and-staffing-trends-in-Utilities---Enterprise-ICT-investment-plans.html#utm_source=prnewswire&utm_medium=pr&utm_campaign=IT_Services

Product Synopsis

This report presents the findings from a survey of 149 utilities regarding their Information and Communications Technology (ICT) budgets and staff allocation. The survey investigates how utilities currently allocate their ICT budgets across the core areas of ICT spend, namely hardware, software, IT services, communications and consulting.

Introduction and Landscape

Why was the report written?
In order to provide a depth of insight into ICT vendors' and service providers' potential customers.

What is the current market landscape and what is changing?
According to Kable's survey, the allocation of ICT budgets to hardware and services is expected to remain at the same level in 2013 as in 2012, whilst the budget allocation for software is expected to increase over the same period.

What are the key drivers behind recent market changes?
While utilities' investment in client computing devices and networks to support advanced technologies like cloud computing and smart grids is providing impetus to their hardware spending, software expenditure is being driven by organisations' requirement to streamline their operations, improve customer experience, and adopt agile methodologies.

What makes this report unique and essential to read?
Kable Global ICT Intelligence has invested significant resources in order to interview CIOs and IT managers about their IT Budgets. Very few IT analyst houses will have interviewed 140+ ICT decision makers in the utility industry in H2 2012.

Key Features and Benefits

Understand how ICT budgets are set to change in 2013 in terms of their overall size.

Appreciate how budgets are allocated across the core elements of ICT spend, including hardware, software, services, communications and consulting.

Learn how ICT money is being spent in areas such as the data centre, applications, IT management and the network.

Establish how IT staff are typically allocated within utilities.

Gain insight into with whom utilities plan to spend their ICT money.

Key Market Issues

According to Kable's survey, the average ICT budget spent on end-user computing is set to decrease by 1% in 2013 to reach 14% .

With utilities increasingly looking towards technologies like smart grids and M2M communications to improve their competitiveness amidst increasing customer expectations, there has been a significant rise in their data storage requirements, which is likely to drive demand for data centres.

The increasing incidence of cyber and malware attacks on data and networks are driving the demand for security services such as threat and vulnerability management services, IT security management services, security compliance services, and secure communications and content services.

Kable's survey shows that utilities are planning to increase their spending on internal development and maintenance - from 24% in 2012 to 25% in 2013 - signifying that these firms are keen to improve their capabilities to support in-house project development and innovation.

Kable's survey finds that the average budget allocation for telcos is set to decline by 1% in 2013 compared to 2012.

Key Highlights

Kable's survey suggests that utilities are allocating a major portion of their external ICT budgets on hardware, software, and IT services in 2013, which is slightly higher than their combined allocation in 2012.

According to the survey, utilities are set to increase their ICT budget allocations to IT management from 11% in 2012 to 12% in 2013 to ensure the effective and efficient management of their IT assets.

Technology (product) vendors and systems integrators are given higher importance by utilities, with average allocations of 17% and 16% respectively in 2012. Moreover, spending with technology (product) vendors and systems integrators is expected to retain the status quo in 2013 as well.

Kable's survey indicates that the largest proportion of IT staff members has been employed on the development and maintenance of the overall ICT infrastructure, including end user systems, data centres, networks, and communications.

In an effort to minimise costs and reduce the hassle of managing applications, utilities are slowly shifting their focus to software as a service (SaaS), allocating 21% of their software budgets on average to this category.
1 Trends in ICT budgets
1.1 Introduction
1.2 Survey demographics
1.3 ICT budget changes
1.4 ICT budget allocation by core technology area
1.5 ICT budget allocation by function
1.6 ICT spending by entity
1.7 IT staff distribution
2 Detailed ICT budget allocations

2.1 Introduction
2.2 Hardware budget breakdown
2.3 Software budget breakdowns
2.4 Third party IT services expenditure
2.5 Telecommunications budget
3 Summary
3.1 Utilities are focusing on strengthening their core infrastructures to accommodate new and advanced technologies
4 Appendix
4.1 Definitions
4.2 Further reading
4.3 Contact the authors

List of Tables

Table 1: Utilities - enterprise ICT survey geographic breakdown
Table 2: Utilities - enterprise ICT survey breakdown by size band (number of employees)
Table 3: Recent and expected ICT budget changes among utilities
Table 4: Utilities' (external) ICT budget allocation, 2012 and 2013
Table 5: Utilities' ICT budget allocation by function, 2012 and 2013
Table 6: Utilities' (external) ICT budget allocation by entity, 2012 and 2013
Table 7: Average allocation of full-time IT staff members in utilities
Table 8: Utilities' average hardware budget allocation
Table 9: Average allocation of software budgets in utilities
Table 10: Utilities' average software budget allocation by technology
Table 11: Utilities' average IT services budget allocation
Table 12: Utilities' average IT consulting services budget allocation
Table 13: Utilities' average telecommunications budget allocation

List of Figures

Figure 1: Utilities - enterprise ICT survey geographic breakdown
Figure 2: Utilities - enterprise ICT survey breakdown by size band (number of employees)
Figure 3: Recent and expected ICT budget changes among utilities
Figure 4: Utilities' (external) ICT budget allocation, 2012 and 2013
Figure 5: Utilities' ICT budget allocation by function, 2012 and 2013
Figure 6: Utilities' ICT budget allocation by entity, 2012 and 2013
Figure 7: Average allocation of full-time IT staff members in utilities
Figure 8: Utilities' average hardware budget allocation
Figure 9: Average allocation of software budgets in utilities
Figure 10: Utilities' average software budget allocation by technology
Figure 11: Utilities' average IT services budget allocation
Figure 12: Utilities' average IT consulting services budget allocation
Figure 13: Utilities' average telecommunications budget allocation

To order this report: ICT budget and staffing trends in Utilities - Enterprise ICT investment plans
http://www.reportlinker.com/p01906915/ICT-budget-and-staffing-trends-in-Utilities---Enterprise-ICT-investment-plans.html#utm_source=prnewswire&utm_medium=pr&utm_campaign=IT_Services

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