IT Spending by Industry | Flexera Blog (2024)

In theFlexera2020State ofTech Spendreportwe identified IT spending by industryacrossfinancial services, retail, healthcare, software, services, hosting, industrial and consumer products, transportation and logistics. We gathered IT spending data from 300enterpriseCIOs andIT executives in large and medium organizations in order to provide benchmarksagainst peer organizations for a variety of industries.

Contents:
IT spending by industry charts

  • IT Spend by Industry
  • Expected Change in IT Spend
  • Breakdown of IT Spend by Industry
  • Expected Change in On-Prem Software Spend
  • Expected Change in SaaS Spend
  • Expected Change in Number of Data Centers
  • Expected Change in IaaS/Paas Spend
  • Top 3 Priorities for Technology Initiatives
  • Digital Transformation is “Top 3” by Industry
  • Cybersecurity is “Top 3” by Industry
  • Cloud is “Top 3” by Industry
  • Employees in IT by Industry
  • IT Spend Controlled by Business Units

IT spend by industry

The average IT spend across all industries was 8.2 percent of revenue. Unsurprisingly, software and hosting companies had the highest spend as compared to revenues. Financial services organizations also showed higher than average spend at 10 percent of revenue.

IT Spending by Industry | Flexera Blog (1)

Trend: Change in IT spending by industry in 2020

Across all industries, 56 percent of organizations expected an increase in IT spend in 2020, compared to 20 percent expecting a decrease. However, there was significant variation by industry, with 85 percent of retail organizations planning to increase 2020 IT spend, more than double the 42 percent of consumer products companies planning to grow IT investments.

IT Spending by Industry | Flexera Blog (2)

Software, SaaS, and cloud spend by industry

On average, almost half of IT budgets are allocated to a combination of on-premises software (22 percent), SaaS (7 percent) and IaaS/PaaS (18 percent). Together, the cloud spend across SaaS and IaaS/PaaS averages 25 percent. However, several industries spend more than 30 percent of IT budgets in cloud, led by healthcare at 33 percent, technology hosting (32 percent) and consumer products (32 percent).

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Trend: Shift from on-premises software to SaaS

Organizations plan to shift spend away from software toward SaaS in 2020.

Change in on-premises software spending by industry in 2020

Across all industries, 55 percent of organizations are planning to decrease spend for on-premises software in 2020, compared to 23 percent expecting to increase. At the high end, 34 percent of retailers are growing on-premises software investments, while at the low end only 6 percent of transportation and logistics companies expect to grow software spend.

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Change in SaaS spending by industry in 2020

In contrast to on-premises software, 81 percent of organizations across all industries expect to increase SaaS spend in 2020, with 28 percent expecting significant increases. Transportation and logistics companies are aggressively shifting from on-premises to SaaS, with 94 percent planning to increase SaaS spend. This aligns with their expectation of decreased spend for on-premise software.

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Trend: Shift from data centers to public cloud

Similar to the shift from on-premises software to SaaS, enterprises are reducing their use of data centers as they move workloads to public cloud IaaS/PaaS.

Change in data centers by industry in 2020

Only 8 percent of organizations plan to increase their number of data centers in 2020, while 65 percent plan to decrease. Retail is leading the shift with 86 percent planning to shrink the number of data centers, followed by transportation and logistics with 82 percent decreasing data centers.

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Change in public cloud spending by industry in 2020

While the number of data centers will go down for most organizations, the use of public cloud will go up for 86 percent of organizations, with 41 percent expecting significant increases. Transportation and logistics companies are shifting quickly to IaaS/PaaS, with 100 percent planning to increase IaaS/PaaS spend and 50 percent planning significant increases. Transportation and logistics organization follow with 94 percent planning to increase IaaS/PaaS use.

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2020 IT initiatives by industry

The 2020 State of Tech Spend report showed that across all respondents, the top three strategic initiatives were digital transformation, cybersecurity and cloud. However, the emphasis on those varied significantly by industry.

IT Spending by Industry | Flexera Blog (8)

Digital transformation initiatives by industry

Services organizations were most likely to focus on digital transformation, with 95 percent ranking it one of their top three initiatives. Consumer products organizations (74 percent) and retailers (69 percent) were also significantly more likely to cite digital transformation as a top initiative. Both of these industries are facing significant competition from online retailers and are focusing on a variety of technologies to help them improve digital and multi-channel customer experiences. Transportation and logistics are focusing on how to make last-mile delivery more cost effective.

Technology hosting and software companies were the least likely to focus on digital transformation, as many of these organizations have already made the shift to digital.

IT Spending by Industry | Flexera Blog (9)

Cybersecurity initiatives by industry

Industrial products (61 percent), healthcare (60 percent) and financial services (56 percent) organizations were most likely to rank cybersecurity among their top three initiatives. Surprisingly, given several high-profile security breaches of customer data, only 31 percent of retailers reported cybersecurity as one of their top three focus areas.

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Cloud initiatives by industry

Technology hosting (67 percent) and software companies (59 percent) lead the pack in citing cloud as one of their top three initiatives. They are followed closely by retail (47 percent), healthcare (44 percent) and services (43 percent) industries, with a higher than average focus on cloud. Conversely, only 31 percent of transportation and logistics companies were focused on cloud initiatives, a seeming contradiction with their first-place position in the expected growth in IaaS/PaaS and SaaS spend.

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Percentage of employees in IT by industry

On average, organizations reported 13.8 percent of employees were in the IT function. Technology hosting (41.5 percent), software (36.5 percent ), financial services (16 percent) and services (14.2 percent) companies showed higher than average numbers of IT employees. Consumer products and healthcare organizations were just below the average with 12.4 percent and 11.6 percent of employees in IT respectively, while retail, transportation and logistics and industrial products industries were below 7 percent.

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Decentralized and shadow IT spend by industry

In most large organizations, business units control a portion of IT spend which often includes shadow IT. The 2020 State of Tech Spend report found that 26 percent of IT spend was controlled by business units, but that increased to 28 percent for organizations with more than 10,000 employees. However, technology hosting, software and financial services organizations reported that 34 to 35 percent of IT spend is decentralized and controlled by business units.

IT Spending by Industry | Flexera Blog (13)

Summary:

We found that most organizations plan to increase IT spend in 2020. Digital transformation is a key driver of technology spend, with companies planning to make larger investments in SaaS and public cloud next year. Most companies are planning to decrease their use of data centers and on-premises software to fund this shift. Organizations can also reduce wasted technology spend by optimizing their use of software, SaaS and cloud.

IT Spending by Industry | Flexera Blog (14)

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Methodology

This IT spend-by-industry data came from the Flexera 2020 State of Tech Spend Report. The report was based on 303 responses from a validated panel of IT executives. Per-industry data is provided for industries with more than 15 respondents. Weighted-average data incorporates data from all 303 respondents, including industries with 15 or fewer respondents.

The count of respondents in each industry is shown below. Full demographics for the respondents are available by downloading the Flexera 2020 State of Tech Spend Report.

IT Spending by Industry | Flexera Blog (15)

IT Spending by Industry | Flexera Blog (2024)

FAQs

Which industry spends the most on information technology? ›

This statistic shows IT spending as share of companies' revenue by industry worldwide in 2022. According to the source, software and tech hosting/cloud companies have much higher spend on IT than other industries, accounting 18 percent and 11 percent of revenue respectively.

What is the IT spending trend for 2023? ›

Worldwide IT spending is projected to total $4.6 trillion in 2023, an increase of 5.5% from 2022, according to the latest forecast by Gartner, Inc.

What is the trend in IT spending? ›

Spending on core IT segments saw growth, including Enterprise software which grew 7.1% to $783 billion in 2022 and Data Center Systems which grew by 12%. Gartner is now forecasting total IT spending growth of around 2.4% for 2023. This is down by half from Gartner's prior October estimate for 2023 IT spending.

How much do tech companies spend on IT? ›

In fact, companies will spend $3.5 trillion globally on tech alone this year including enterprise software, hardware, and telecommunication services (Peterson, 2018). And you might be surprised that the smaller the company, the more they spend. “The average small company spends 6.9% of revenue on IT.

What is a typical IT budget? ›

The average cost for a typical IT budget is as follows: Small Companies – Less Than $50 Million (6.9% of revenue) Mid-Sized Companies – Between $50 Million – $2 Billion (4.1% of revenue) Large Companies – Over $2 Billion (4.1% of revenue)

What are the top 5 tech industry? ›

Big Tech, also known as the Tech Giants, refers to the most dominant companies in the information technology industry, notably the five largest American tech companies: Alphabet (Google), Amazon, Apple, Meta (Facebook), and Microsoft. These companies are referred to as the Big Five.

Which technologies will dominate in 2023? ›

Top New Technology Trends
  • Computing Power.
  • Smarter Devices.
  • Datafication.
  • Artificial Intelligence and Machine Learning.
  • Extended Reality.
  • Digital Trust.
  • 3D Printing.
  • Genomics.
Apr 3, 2023

Which IT technology is most in demand in 2023? ›

Here is the list of the most in-demand and trending tech skills that will offer you a successful career:
  • Data Science.
  • Cloud Computing.
  • Artificial Intelligence.
  • DevOps.
  • Blockchain.
  • RPA (Robotic Process Automation)
  • Augmented Reality (AR) and Virtual Reality (VR)
  • Cybersecurity.
Apr 25, 2023

Which areas of technologies will you invest in 2023? ›

The leading technology trends in 2023 will revolve around AI, cloud, cybersecurity, the metaverse, crypto, robotics, IoT and quantum computing.

What are 5 emerging or current trends in information technology? ›

Artificial intelligence and machine learning. Edge computing and quantum computing. Cybersecurity. Blockchain.

What are two recent IT trends? ›

We have listed some of the most-recent new technology breakthroughs to keep an eye on.
  • Full Stack Development. Full-stack development is the latest technology trend in the software industry that is gaining momentum. ...
  • Cybersecurity. ...
  • Blockchain. ...
  • Edge Computing. ...
  • Internet of Behaviors. ...
  • Predictive analytics. ...
  • Snowflake. ...
  • DevOps.
6 days ago

How much should an IT budget be in a business? ›

The 4-6% average is a great guideline, but the final number will depend on your company's individual needs and goals.

What companies spend the most on IT? ›

This data was published in June 2018 and summarizes spending from 2017.
  • Samsung Electronics – $2.41 billion. ...
  • Alphabet, Inc. ...
  • Charter Communications – $2.42 billion. ...
  • Ford Motor Company – $2.45 billion. ...
  • Verizon Communications – $2.64 billion. ...
  • General Motors – $3.24 billion. ...
  • Amazon – $3.38 billion. ...
  • AT&T – $3.52 billion.

What is the global IT spending forecast? ›

Worldwide IT spending is projected to total $4.5 trillion in 2023, an increase of 2.4% from 2022, according to the latest forecast by Gartner, Inc. This is down from the previous quarter's forecast of 5.1% growth.

What is the 70% rule budget? ›

The 70-20-10 rule holds that: 70 percent of your after-tax income should go toward basic monthly expenses like housing, utilities, food, transportation, and personal living expenses; 20 percent should be saved or put into investments, leaving 10 percent for debt repayment.

What is the 50 20 30 budget rule? ›

Our 50/30/20 calculator divides your take-home income into suggested spending in three categories: 50% of net pay for needs, 30% for wants and 20% for savings and debt repayment.

What items should go in an IT budget? ›

Every IT budget has three IT expense categories: capital, project, and operating. Capital expenses include software licenses, replacements, hardware purchases, etc. The project budget consists of expenses that are incentive-specific. Operating expenses include maintenance costs, subscriptions, etc.

What is the richest IT company in the world? ›

Microsoft is the world's leading and valuble and the most visible IT company, with over $161 billion in revenue in 2022. Microsoft Corporation was founded in 1975 by Bill Gates and Paul Allen in Redmond, Washington, and is one of the world's largest technology companies.

What is the biggest IT company in the world? ›

The top tech companies span numerous sectors and products, including phones, social media, appliances, and computer hardware. Apple, the world's largest tech company by revenue, generated $378.7 billion in 2022. Many of the biggest tech companies employ hundreds of thousands of people.

What are the biggest IT sectors? ›

1. Tata Consultancy service
  • Tata Consultancy service is the Largest IT company in India in terms of Revenue. ...
  • TCS offers a consulting-led, cognitive powered, integrated portfolio of business, technology and engineering services and solutions.
Mar 5, 2023

What is the next big tech 2030? ›

Artificial intelligence (AI), cloud computing, and virtual and augmented reality (VR and AR) are among the key technologies that will underpin the delivery of education in 2030.

What technology is booming in 2030? ›

Human-Like AI Will Likely Become A Reality

By 2030, there will be exponential improvements of computer processing power, voice recognition, image recognition, deep learning and other software algorithms. Likewise, natural language processing technologies like GPT-3 are constantly being updated and surpassed.

Which technology is booming in future? ›

Artificial Intelligence, Blockchain, Cloud Computing, Data Science, Virtual Reality, Cyber Security etc, are some of the best technology to get into in 2023.

Which is the hottest skill in it? ›

A guide about best IT skills to learn in 2023
  1. Basic programming. Programming basics is a frequent in-demand skill even among non-tech jobs. ...
  2. Low-code platforms. ...
  3. UI/UX design. ...
  4. Data engineering. ...
  5. Data visualization. ...
  6. Video editing. ...
  7. CRMs. ...
  8. Product management.
Mar 11, 2023

What is the easiest IT skill to learn? ›

Skill #1.

HTML is the building block for significant web development technologies in the industry. It helps you design web pages as you wish, and the code snippets we use in HTML are easy to understand. HTML tags are human-readable and make it easy for anyone to learn and create good-looking web pages.

Which technology is best in 2025? ›

5 Major Technology Trends to Prepare for by 2025
  • Automation at scale. The concept of “hyper-automation” has gained increasing attention in recent years. ...
  • New Standards for AI Investments. ...
  • The Rise of Distributed Cloud Environments. ...
  • The Extended Edge. ...
  • Innovative CX Strategies Evolve.
Jan 2, 2023

What will be the fastest growing industries in 2023? ›

Growing sectors for 2023
  • Metaverse.
  • Influencer marketing.
  • 3. Entertainment.
  • Personalised attention.
  • Social causes.
  • Supply chain.
  • Neuromarketing.
  • Ecommerce.

What are the emerging technologies in it? ›

The emerging, supporting technologies and trends include (but are not limited to) spatial computing and the spatial web; digital persistence; multientity environments; decentralization tech; high-speed, low-latency networking; sensing technologies; and AI applications.

What are the best tech stocks to buy now? ›

Best Emerging Tech Stocks to Buy Now
  • Conduent Incorporated (NASDAQ:CNDT) Number of Hedge Fund Investors In Q4 2022: 20. ...
  • PAR Technology Corporation (NYSE:PAR) Number of Hedge Fund Investors In Q4 2022: 20. ...
  • Clearfield, Inc. (NASDAQ:CLFD) ...
  • GoPro, Inc. (NASDAQ:GPRO) ...
  • Benchmark Electronics, Inc. (NYSE:BHE)
Apr 19, 2023

What is the future in IT industry? ›

Increased Focus on Digital Skills

The IT industry is constantly evolving, and IT professionals need to continuously update their skills to stay competitive. In the future, there will be a greater emphasis on digital skills, such as coding, data analysis, and machine learning.

What is the third wave of information technology? ›

The Cloud Era (Infrastructure 2.0) was driven by web-scale giants in the 2000's using a new kinds of technologies– Linux, KVM, Xen, Docker, Kubernetes, Mesos, MySQL, MongoDB, Kafka, Hadoop, Spark, and many others. And now machine learning and artificial intelligence is driving the Third Wave.

What are the four key technological trends? ›

Enterprises are strongly influenced by new trends like social media, cloud computing, mobile connectivity, and big data.

What are the big 5 emerging technologies? ›

The five technologies are Big Data, Machine Learning, Artificial Intelligence, the Internet of Things (IoT), and the Blockchain.

What is the largest of the four information technology pathways? ›

Initially largest was development as there were many things to be developed but now as there are multiple things developed, so the largest according to me is maintenance.

What is the next big thing 2023? ›

Green hydrogen, nuclear fusion and other green technologies will be developing fast in 2023, as the world transitions away from carbon. Other technology trends include developments in gene editing, quantum computing and connected devices. Expect artificial intelligence to get even smarter in 2023.

What will be the technology in 2050? ›

According to Forbes, by 2050, IoT technology will be in 95% of electronics for new product designs. And by 2050 it is expected to have everything connected to the cloud and to the internet. According to Business Insider, Space tourism could be feasible in 2050, but likely only for the very wealthy.

What is the 1% rule budget? ›

It's simple: When something you want to purchase exceeds 1% of your annual gross income, wait a day before buying it. The 1% income cap will limit how much you can spend in a day, and the 24-hour waiting period will take the thrill out of impulse buying.

How do I make an IT department budget? ›

How to create an IT budget: 8 tips for planning ahead
  1. Look to the past to plan the future. ...
  2. Establish your priorities. ...
  3. Align with company goals. ...
  4. Identify ongoing expenses. ...
  5. Establish any project expenses. ...
  6. Keep security in mind. ...
  7. Don't cut corners to cut costs. ...
  8. Use data to make decisions.
Nov 22, 2022

What percentage of budget should be spent on IT? ›

The 70/20/10 budget rule works by allotting 70% of your income for monthly bills and everyday spending such as cell phones, groceries or utilities, then 20% goes to saving and investing and 10% goes to debt repayment.

Which company dominates the IT industry? ›

#1 Apple Inc.

Apple designs, manufactures, and markets a broad range of consumer technology products. These include smartphones, personal computers, tablets, wearable devices, home entertainment devices, and much more. Some of its most popular products include its iPhone smartphones and Mac computers.

Which is the biggest IT company by employees? ›

1. Tata Consultancy Services (TCS) - TCS is one of the largest IT services companies in India, and employs over six lakh people worldwide. The company provides a wide range of services, including consulting, software development, and business process outsourcing.

What is the biggest American IT company in world? ›

Microsoft:

Located in Redmond, Washington, region Microsoft is the oldest IT company in the US top IT companies list. It primarily deals in computer software. Microsoft Office suite, Edge web browsers, Windows Operating systems, and Internet explorers are some of Microsoft's notable and globally used software.

What is the IT spending trend in 2023? ›

Worldwide IT spending is projected to total $4.6 trillion in 2023, an increase of 5.5% from 2022, according to the latest forecast by Gartner, Inc. Despite continued global economic turbulence, all regions worldwide are projected to have positive IT spending growth in 2023.

What is the total global IT spending? ›

Spending on business software and IT services is expected to remain steady year-over-year, together accounting for more than $2.16 trillion in projected spending in 2023, Gartner said. Within IT services, spending on consulting services alone is projected to reach $264 billion, up 6.7% from 2022, Gartner said.

Which country spends the most on technology? ›

The United States ranks as the country investing most in digital technologies, investing the most money in every category worldwide.

What is the main information technology industry? ›

The three major industry groups within the IT sector are software and services, technology hardware and equipment, and semiconductors and semiconductor equipment.

What are the top three industries in information systems? ›

Top Industries for Information Systems Professionals
  • Healthcare/Hospitals. Grand View Research reports that, in 2015, the global hospital information systems (HIS) market was valued at $13.26 billion dollars. ...
  • Airports/Air Travel. ...
  • Financial Services. ...
  • Manufacturing. ...
  • Your Future, Your Choice.

What are the four main information technologies? ›

There are four primary elements for information technology as a whole: information security, database and network management, computer technical support, and business software development.

What are the IT technology sectors? ›

The technology sector is comprised of businesses that sell goods and services in electronics, software, computers, artificial intelligence, and other industries related to information technology (IT).

How big is the IT industry in the US? ›

The US tech industry market is worth around $1.6 trillion. The tech industry is expected to reach a $5 trillion market value by the end of 2021. About 71% of consumers consider texting to businesses an effective form of communication. 68% of tech industry employees in the US are Caucasian.

What are the six major types of information systems? ›

What Are The Types Of Information Systems?
  • Knowledge Work System. ...
  • Management Information System. ...
  • Decision Support System. ...
  • Office Automation System. ...
  • Transaction Processing System. ...
  • Executive Support System.
Jul 14, 2022

Is the IT industry growing? ›

How many jobs are available in technology? There are at least 3.97 million tech jobs available in the US as of 2022. And this number continues to grow. In 2021 roughly 245,000 new tech jobs were added to that number, and by the end of 2022 there will be another 178,000 added.

What is the most widely used information system? ›

The Most Popular Types of Information Systems
  • Knowledge Work System (KWS) ...
  • Office Automation System (OAS) ...
  • Decision Support System (DSS) ...
  • Transaction Processing System (TPS) ...
  • Management Information System (MIS) ...
  • Executive Support System. ...
  • Expert. ...
  • Conclusion.
Dec 7, 2022

What is the biggest growing IT field? ›

This is considered one of the top best-paying jobs in technology. The U.S.Bureau of Labor Statistics sees strong growth in the data science field and predicts the number of jobs will increase by about 28% through 2026. Is data science the fastest-growing tech job? The answer is a resounding YES!

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