Small businesses' IT spend on rise

As the economy booms, both large businesses and small and medium enterprises (SMEs) are growing rapidly to become global players.

But are these companies equipped to face the competitive challenges that arise in a global scenario? Can they evolve from phase 1, categorised as being just operationally efficient organisations into phase II, being process efficient next generation enterprises?

According to a research by the ICT consulting practice at Frost & Sullivan (F&S), Indian enterprises spent more that $50 million in 2005 for reworking their IT infrastructure.

More than 56 per cent of Chief Information Officers (CIOs) stated that junking their installed software is the most difficult decision they face. Companies are reinvesting in Enterprise Resource Planning systems (ERPs), laboratory Information Systems, HR modules to name a few.

In a bid to create awareness on IT infrastructure that can grow and adapt with products, applications and systems software, FAS hosted a seminar on 'The Business Imperative for Next Generation Enterprise Software and Systems'.

The company got together Hewlett-Packard, SAS and Trend Micro to bring to fore the trend of 'adaptive enterprises' that are driven by flexibility that is they look beyond setting up of infrastructure at productivity, cost and capital efficiencies and security.

Pointing out to the trend that in the journey from phase I to phase II several companies are adopting frameworks such as IT Service Management (ITSM) to bridge the gap between IT and business processes and technology issues, Bithin Talukar, Market development and Alliances Manager, HP Software, India said, "The concept of service management has been here for the last five years with companies like Wipro, Tata Consultancy Services, Satyam, HCL Comnet being amongst its early adopters. The movement is now coming to the fore with the Indian chapter of ITSM Forum coming to India earlier this year."

Most product companies like HP with its HP OpenView Suite, IBM with its Tivoli Suite, Computer Associates with Its Unicenter suite and BMC to name a few are offering ITSM software.

Affirming that enterprises are now getting more conscious of IT as part of their growth strategy and setting aside investments for adoption of IT solutions, Alok Shinde, Director (ICT Practice, India), F&S said, "The IT Information Management Software is expected to grow at a Compounded Annual Growth Rate of 23 per cent from about $150 million in 2003 to near about $500 million in 2009."