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These were the findings of a new on-line survey released by Deloitte & Touche and Amarach Consulting, which was based on the responses of 346 managers and executives in Irish companies.
Sixty-one percent of respondents to the survey said that the level of IT investment in their organisation would increase in 2003 relative to 2002. Only 17 percent expected that their organisation would not be increasing spending.
Other findings in the survey showed that 82 percent of respondents believed that investment in IT represented good value for money. Only 6 percent disagreed with this opinion. "This augurs well for those in the IT sector, who have been operating in an extremely difficult market," the survey said.
"The positive indications regarding IT spend are interesting and indicate that companies are still investing in essential systems," said David Hearn, a partner Deloitte & Touche management consulting in Dublin. "Among our clients, we are still seeing strong demand for customer relationship management, e-business, enterprise applications, technology integration."
The survey also showed that Irish companies are using their Web sites to perform increasingly involved tasks and these firms are anxious to enjoy the benefits of broadband technology. For example, the survey found that 87 percent of businesses in Ireland had a Web site, with Web site ownership highest among technology, business service and public bodies. Web site ownership was lowest in the construction industry.
Seventy-nine percent of companies use their Web site for advertising, 53 percent use it for interacting with customers, 40 percent for recruitment, 31 percent for internal communication through an intranet and 20 percent use their own Web sites for research.
But others use the Internet for interactive e-commerce activities and 23 percent said they use their own Web sites to sell goods on-line, a further 13 percent use their site for on-line purchases. Additionally 10 percent of the businesses in the survey said they bank on-line and 59 percent said they often make on-line purchases.
When asked whether the lack of availability of broadband was a major issue for Irish business, around 82 percent of the companies said it was an issue. Only 4 percent of the respondents said the availability of broadband was not a concern. "There was general dissatisfaction with broadband availability," the survey concluded, "and this is likely to become an increasingly important issue and may hinder IT investment."
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