Security And Data Protection Will Continue To Be Very High Priorities In 2013

According to the latest 2013 predictions from the European Vertical Markets group at International Data Corporation (IDC), IT spending will grow above the market average in the professional services industry, which includes legal, accounting, consulting, architecture, and engineering companies.

“The professional services industry is now forecast to grow at 4 percent in a market that on average is growing at 1.8 percent,” said Angela Vacca, Research Manager, European Vertical Markets. “This means that the professional services industry is still investing while most other sectors are experiencing a moderate or flat trend.”

IDC also predicts that:

• Legal and accounting will be the best performing subindustries. The outlook varies by subindustry, country, and company size, but across subindustries, IDC forecasts that the biggest spending increases will be in legal and accounting companies, as they have a positive business outlook and a greater willingness to spend on IT.

• Cost reduction will remain a hot issue for many reasons, including the fact that professional services companies’ businesses are changing, and this is resulting in increasing complexity, which in turn could lead to greater operating costs.

• Security and data protection will be key and will continue to be very high priorities in 2013.

• Customer care will enter the top 3 business priorities. Customer care has not traditionally been a top challenge for professional services companies, but now that competition is increasing, it is becoming increasingly important. IT, legal, and consulting companies in particular rank customer care very highly.

• Storage investments will increase, driven by regulatory concerns and business issues. Big Data remains tepid.

• Project-related solutions will see major investments in 2013 as industry-specific applications are essential for professional services companies’ business operations.

• Cloud is slowly taking ground.

• Mobile solution adoption will continue to grow.

• Social media adoption will almost double.