ITIC Reports & Surveys

ITIC 2010 Editorial Calendar & Surveys

Editorial Calendars / By

ITIC differentiates itself with independent, non-sponsored Web-based surveys. We conduct these surveys in partnership with Sunbelt Software on a wide range of hardware, software, networking and business-issues related technology topics.

Quickly executed surveys often capture critical opportunities in rapidly changing markets.

This is an exciting and challenging time for the high technology industry. There continue to be many emerging high growth technologies and changes in the status quo for some legacy technologies, all of which can present unique and difficult challenges for both the vendor and user community. Corporate IT departments are under cost constraints and tasked with accomplishing more with the same or fewer purchasing dollars. More than ever, strategists require tools that offer timely insight into changing market conditions.

Below is ITIC’s 2010 Editorial Calendar. It provides a detailed list of our upcoming research including a list of forthcoming survey topics which ITIC will conduct over the next two (2) quarters. We will continue to update this list with the dates and times when the surveys will go live and provide you with links to participate if you so choose. And please feel free to contact us and let us know if you have ideas for future survey topics.

Upcoming Survey Topics

January: 2010 -2011 Technology and Business Deployment Trends and Timetables

Description: This ITIC Report, based on survey data and first person customer interviews will provide a detailed overview of the challenges facing IT departments in 2010. These include: budget and staffing issues, deployment trends and migration issues and how IT departments are handling crucial issues such as security, storage and disaster recovery during the ongoing economic downturn. The Report will present the latest ITIC survey data (done in conjunction with Stratus Technologies and Sunbelt Software) based on a poll of 650 IT managers and C-level executives worldwide.

February: Database Deployment Trends & Issues

Description: This survey and report examines the crucial role of databases in today’s network environments. It will poll users on their preferred database vendor; satisfaction with price, performance, features, technical service and support and licensing policies of the major database vendors. It will also detail the reasons customers chose a particular database and vendor and delve into the top technical and business challenges confronting users as they strive to upgrade, manage and maintain their database environments and adapt them to new technology models like virtualization and cloud computing.

March/April: Server Hardware and Server OS Reliability Survey

Description: Reliability and uptime are absolutely essential; corporations of all sizes increasingly require 99.99% availability and greater. But which platforms actually deliver? This survey will poll businesses on the reliability, uptime and management issues involving amount of annual outages associated with the major server operating systems and server hardware platforms. The survey will poll customers on the frequency and number of Tier 1, Tier 2 and Tier 3 outages that occur on their core server OS and server hardware platforms. The results of this independent, non-vendor sponsored survey will provide businesses with the information they need to determine the TCO and ROI of their individual environments. The survey will also enable the server OS and server hardware vendors to see how their products rate among global users ranging from SMBs with as few as 25 people to the largest global enterprises with 100,000+ end users.

April/May: Virtualization Deployment Trends, Desktop and Server hardware:

Description: This ITIC survey and report will focus on the current and emerging virtualization technologies including server, desktop (VDI), application, storage and network virtualization. The survey and report will also focus on the crucial nature of virtualization management as well as key issues (pricing, technology challenges etc.) involving and impacting virtualization deployments including Cloud computing, virtualization management and virtualization management issues. The study will poll corporate customers on their primary virtualization vendor(s); ways in which they are utilizing virtualization; the impact (positive or negative) that virtualization has had on their business; quantifying the TCO and ROI of virtualization; the primary reasons customers are deploying or deferring a move to the technology; virtualization licensing issues and virtualization security issues. Vendors profiled in this report will include: VMware, Citrix, Microsoft, HP, IBM, Oracle (now incorporating Sun Microsystems and Virtual Iron) and Parallels.

June: Server and Application Deployment Trends and Issues

Description: This Report will present the findings of an ITIC/Sunbelt Software Web-based survey that polls users on desktop and server hardware and application related topics. Featured vendors will include: Dell, Hewlett-Packard, IBM, Lenovo and Sun, As always, ITIC will supplement the Web-based responses with first person customer interviews. ITIC will also get vendor reaction to the survey results. The survey will cover:

  • Primary desktop and server hardware vendor(s)
  • Average life cycles of Windows, Linux, UNIX and Mac desktop and server hardware (including file/print servers; database servers; Email/messaging/collaboration servers and Web servers)
  • Percentage of hardware that a company replaces when it does a major upgrade
  • How much corporations spend on their mainstream line of business servers and desktops
  • Primary server configuration (e.g., two processors, four processors, eight processors, etc.)
  • Current and planned deployments for 32- and 64-bit environments
  • Current and planned deployments for mobile desktop hardware
  • Comparison of the reliability and uptime of the major server platforms including: IBM, HP, Dell et al.
  • Adoption rate of Netbooks and Tablets (including the Apple iPad)

July: Unified Communications, Email and collaboration

Description: This Report will utilize the latest ITIC independent survey data to provide an overview of the latest trends in unified communication, Email and collaboration platforms including and alternative platforms like Microsoft Exchange, Lotus Notes/Domino, Scalix, Zarafa and Zimbra. This Report will also deliver insight as to the issues spurring or impeding a move to a unified communications environment as well as user deployment trends and upgrade plans.

August/September: CIOs

Description: This Report will use the latest ITIC survey data to provide CIOs with a detailed snapshot of the business and technology issues that have the greatest impact on their companies. The Report will also incorporate customer case study profiles of up to six CIOs at mid-sized and enterprise organization from various vertical markets.

October: Licensing and Contract Negotiations

Description: Often overlooked, licensing and contract negotiations can have a long term advantageous or potentially damaging impact on your company’s bottom line and technology decisions. This ITIC report will provide a detailed overview of how licensing agreements impact the business decision to upgrade to a new technology platform or delay a migration. This Report will also examine and provide guidance on pivotal issues such as:

  • Is your firm in compliance with the terms and conditions of your current licensing contracts and what to do to address non-compliance?
  • How will new technologies like multi-core and multi-threading and virtualization impact your new licensing agreements?
  • In a tough economy, should your company re-negotiate the terms and conditions of its existing licensing contracts?
  • Can your organization afford to upgrade its current technology and licensing contracts?
  • Is it time to renew your current licensing agreement? If so, what to look for as your firm reviews the terms of the contract
  • Provide negotiating tips and advice on how to get the best deal for your company.

Organizations must have confidence in their vendors, their technology and their own ability to negotiate deals that are cost-effective, readily understandable, focused on their needs and flexible enough to meet and adapt to this rapidly changing and challenging business environment. This ITIC Report will also address the major trends that affect software use, including mobile and remote users, collaboration among various users, and Internet, intranet and extranet use.

November: Remote Workers and Mobility Trends

Description: Increasingly, “the office” is located wherever the end user employee happens to be: a home office, on the road, or connecting via PDAs, mobile and handheld devices from an airport, an automobile or kiosk. This ITIC Report will use the latest survey data to provide you with quantifiable usage statistics on remote, telecommuting and mobile users. It will also examine the Pros and Cons of mobility and ask crucial questions about whether or not these mobile and remote workers are delivering greater value and increased productivity to their respective firms. It will also take a look at the technical and management challenges facing companies as the rate of mobile and remote workers increases. It will also feature corporate case study examples.

December: ITIC 2011 Global IT and Technology Trends Forecast

Description: This Report will be based on ITIC survey results that poll IT administrators and C-level executives on a variety of forward looking business and technology issues for the 2011 – 2012 timeframe. Topics covered will include: IT staffing and budgets; application and network infrastructure upgrades; integration and interoperability between legacy environments and new Web 2.0 and remote and mobile technologies; hardware and software purchasing trends.

***

Virtualization — specifically the TCO and ROI of application and desktop virtualization which are two of the hottest areas. All indications are that the current server virtualization market leaders Citrix, Microsoft, VMware et al. are well positioned as the early market leaders in application virtualization and desktop virtualization (by virtue of their own offerings as well as their respective partnerships with hardware OEMs, software vendors and service providers). This survey will include specific product comparison queries and ask corporations to rate the performance, reliability and scalability of products such as VMware’s Live Migration vs. Microsoft’s Hyper-V; compare and contrast the major virtualization desktop, application and management offerings from the major vendors like Citrix, Microsoft, Oracle, Parallels, Sun, VMware, Virtual Iron and others. It will also address management and licensing issues and trends.

Server OS and Server hardware Reliability survey — This survey will poll businesses on the reliability, uptime and management issues involving amount of annual outages associated with the major server operating systems and server hardware platforms. The survey will poll customers on the frequency and number of Tier 1, Tier 2 and Tier 3 outages that occur on their core server OS and server hardware platforms. The results of this independent, non-vendor sponsored survey will provide businesses with the information they need to determine the TCO and ROI of their individual environments. The survey will also enable the server OS and server hardware vendors to see how their products rate among global users ranging from SMBs with as few as 25 people to the largest global enterprises with 100,000+ end users.

Desktop and Server OS and Office deployment trends and issues — This survey will also provide SWOT analysis (Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats) to the tactical and long term strategic positioning of the Windows, Linux, UNIX and open source OS environments with respect to legacy technologies as well as emerging markets like cloud computing.* Licensing, Compliance and Genuine Software trends and issues. These three business issues are pivotal to corporate success with various technologies. Licensing issues are having a huge impact on emerging technologies like virtualization. This survey will provide a comprehensive overview of user deployment and purchasing of software licensing, maintenance and upgrade programs. It will also examine corporate customer satisfaction (or lack thereof) and understanding of these issues and how it impacts the TCO and ROI of their current and planned software infrastructure.

The rise of the Macintosh in the corporate enterprise. Mac hardware and OS usage is on the rise in the corporate environment and is at its highest level since the late 1980s. This survey will poll corporate IT managers and C-level executives on the issues that are propelling or impeding them to deploy Macs in their networks. It will ask customers to rate the performance, scalability, reliability, and security and management capabilities of the Mac. It will also ask businesses to assess the Pros and Cons of Mac virtualization, integration and interoperability with disparate OS environments such as Windows, Linux and open source.

 Survey Methodology

ITIC partners with Sunbelt Software to conduct secure independent Web-based surveys that contain multiple choice and essay questions. In order to ensure the highest degree of accuracy, we employ authentication and tracking mechanisms to ensure that no one tampers with the survey or votes more than once. We poll businesses across a wide range of vertical markets; respondents range from micro-SMBs with fewer than 25 employees up to the largest multinational enterprises with over 100,000 workers. Each Report also includes extensive first person customer interviews and where applicable, vendor and reseller interviews. The titles of the survey respondents include:

  • Network administrators
  • VPs of IT
  • Chief information officers (CIOs)
  • Chief technology officers (CTOs)
  • Chief executive officers (CEOs)

ITIC welcomes input and suggestion from its vendor and enterprise clients with respect to surveys, survey questions and topics for its Editorial Calendar. If there’s a particular topic or question in a specific survey that you’d like to see covered, please let us know and we will do our best to address it.

About Information Technology Intelligence Consulting (ITIC)

ITIC, founded in 2002, is a research and consulting firm in suburban Boston. It provides primary research on a wide variety of technology topics for vendors and enterprises. ITIC’s mission is to provide its clients with tactical, practical and actionable advice and to help its clients make sense of the technology and business events that influence and impact their infrastructures and IT budgets. ITIC can provide your firm with accurate, objective research on a wide variety of technology topics ranging from software, hardware, networking, virtualization and cloud computing to the services industries that support the technology, including outsourcing. ITIC’s mission is to help vendor and corporate clients make sense of the technology and business events that are impacting their infrastructures and their IT budgets.

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Application Availability, Reliability and Downtime: Ignorance is NOT Bliss

ITIC Reports & Surveys / By

Two out of five businesses – 40% – report that their major business applications require higher availability rates than they did two or three years ago. However an overwhelming 81% are unable to quantify the cost of downtime and only a small 5% minority of businesses are willing to spend whatever it takes to guarantee the highest levels of application availability 99.99% and above. Those are the results of the latest ITIC survey which polled C-level executives and IT managers at 300 corporations worldwide.

ITIC partnered with Stratus Technologies in Maynard, Ma. a vendor that specializes in high availability and fault tolerant hardware and software solutions, to compose the Web-based survey. ITIC conducted this blind, non-vendor and non-product specific survey which polled businesses on their application availability requirements, virtualization and the compliance rate of their service level agreements (SLAs). None of the respondents received any remuneration. The Web-based survey consisted of multiple choice and essay questions. ITIC analysts also conducted two dozen first person customer interviews to obtain detailed anecdotal data.

Respondents ranged from SMBs with 100 users to very large enterprises with over 100,000 end users. Industries represented: academic, advertising, aerospace, banking, communications, consumer products, defense, energy, finance, government, healthcare, insurance, IT services, legal, manufacturing, media and entertainment, telecommunications, transportation, and utilities. None of the survey respondents received any remuneration for their participation. The respondents hailed from 15 countries; 85% were based in North America.

Survey Highlights

The survey results uncovered many “disconnects” between the levels of application reliability that corporate enterprises profess to need and the availability rates their systems and applications actually deliver. Additionally, a significant portion of the survey respondents had difficulty defining what constitutes high application availability; do not specifically track downtime and could not quantify or qualify the cost of downtime and its impact on their network operations and business.

Among the other survey highlights:

  • A 54% majority of IT managers and executives surveyed said more than two-thirds of their companies’ applications require the highest level of availability – 99.99% — or four nines of uptime.
  • Over half – 52% of survey respondents said that virtualization technology increases application uptime and availability; only 4% said availability decreased as a result of virtualization deployments.
  • In response to the question, “which aspect of application availability is most important” to the business, 59% of those polled cited the prevention of unplanned downtime as being most crucial; 40% said disaster recovery and business continuity were most important; 38% said that minimizing planned downtime to apply patches and upgrades was their top priority; 16% said the ability to meet SLAs was most important and 40% of the survey respondents said all of the choices were equally crucial to their business needs.
  • Some 41% said they would be satisfied with conventional 99% to 99.9% (the equivalent of two or three nines) availability for their most critical applications. Ninety-nine percent or 99.9% does not qualify as a high-availability or continuous-availability solution.
  • An overwhelming 81% of survey respondents said the number of applications that demand high availability has increased in the past two-to-three years.
  • Of those who said they have been unable to meet service level agreements (SLAs), 72% can’t or don’t keep track of the cost and productivity losses created by downtime.
  • Budgetary constraints are a gating factor prohibiting many organizations from installing software solutions that would improve application availability. Overall, 70% of the survey respondents said they lacked the funds to purchase value-added availability solutions (40%); or were unsure how much or if their companies would spend to guarantee application availability (30%).
  • Of the 30% of businesses that quantified how much their firms would spend on availability solutions, 3% indicated they would spend $2,000 to $4,000; 8% said $4,000 to $5,000; another 3% said $5,000 to $10,000; 11% — mainly large enterprises indicated they were willing to allocate $10,000 to $15,000 to ensure application availability and 5% said they would spend “whatever it takes.”

According to the survey findings, just under half of all businesses – 49% – lack the budget for high availability technology and 40% of the respondents reported they don’t understand what qualifies as high availability. An overwhelming eight out of 10 IT managers – 80% — are unable to quantify the cost of downtime to their C-level executives.

To reiterate, the ITIC survey polled users on the various aspects and impact of application availability and downtime but it did not specify any products or vendors.

The survey results supplemented by ITIC first person interviews with IT managers and C-level executives clearly shows that on a visceral level, businesses are very aware of the need for increased application availability has grown. This is particularly true in light of the emergence of new technologies like application and desktop virtualization, cloud computing, Service Oriented Architecture (SOA). The fast growing remote, mobile and telecommuting end user population utilizes unified communications and collaboration applications and utilities is also spurring the need for greater application availability and reliability.

High Application Availability Not a Reality for 80% of Businesses

The survey results clearly show that network uptime isn’t keeping pace with the need for application availability. At the same time, IT managers and C-level executives interviewed by ITIC did comprehend the business risks associated with downtime, even though most are unable to quantify the cost of downtime or qualify the impact to the corporation, its customers, suppliers and business partners when unplanned application and network outages occur.

“We are continually being asked to do more with less,” said an IT manager at a large enterprise in the Northeast. “We are now at a point, where the number of complex systems requiring expert knowledge has exceeded the headcount needed to maintain them … I am dreading vacation season,” he added.

Another executive at an Application Service provider acknowledged that even though his firm’s SLA guarantees to customers are a modest 98%, it has on occasion, been unable to meet those goals. The executive said his firm compensated one of its clients for a significant outage incident. “We had a half day outage a couple of years ago which cost us in excess of $40,000 in goodwill payouts to a handful of our clients, despite the fact that it was the first outage in five years,” he said.

Another user said a lack of funds prevented his firm from allocating capital expenditure monies to purchase solutions that would guarantee 99.99% application availability. “Our biggest concern is keeping what we have running and available. Change usually costs money, and at the moment our budgets are simply in survival mode,” he said.

Another VP of IT at a New Jersey-based business said that ignorance is not bliss. “If people knew the actual dollar value their applications and customers represent, they’d already have the necessary software availability solutions in place to safeguard applications,” he said. “Yes, it does cost money to purchase application availability solutions, but we’d rather pay now, then wait for something to fail and pay more later,” the VP of IT said.

Overall, the survey results show that the inability of users to put valid metrics and cost formulas in place to track and quantify what uptime means to their organization is woefully inadequate and many corporations are courting disaster.

ITIC advises businesses to track downtime, the actual cost of downtime to the organization and to take the necessary steps to qualify the impact of downtime including lost data, potential liability risks e.g. lost business, lost customers, potential lawsuits and damage to the company’s reputation. Once a company can quantify the amount of downtime associated with its main line of business applications, the impact of downtime and the risk to the business, it can then make an accurate assessment of whether or not its current IT infrastructure adequately supports the degree of application availability the corporation needs to maintain its SLAs.

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Cost Formulas Essential to Qualify and Quantify Uptime

ITIC Reports & Surveys / By

ITIC survey finds that corporate application availability requirements are increasing; 50% of businesses lack funds for new reliability technology.

BOSTON, MA (April 6, 2009) — Eight out of 10 businesses — 81% — report that their major business applications require higher availability rates than they did two or three years ago. However, nearly three-quarters of companies — 73% — are unable to quantify the cost of downtime or the impact that unplanned outages have on the business. Those are the results of a new survey from Information Technology Intelligence Corporation (ITIC), a high-tech research and consulting firm.

The survey polled 300 C-level executives and IT managers at 300 corporations worldwide. However, the survey findings also indicated that approximately half of all businesses — 49% — lack the budget for high availability technology. Additionally, 40% of the respondents said they don’t understand what qualifies as high availability. Eight out of 10 IT managers can’t quantify the cost of downtime to their C-level executives.

“The demand for application availability has grown, particularly with the emergence of Virtualization 2.0. However, network uptime isn’t keeping pace. Only two out of 10 companies understand that four nines — 99.99% availability and above — is what they need today. The inability of users to put valid metrics and cost formulas in place to track and quantify what uptime means to their organization is woefully inadequate,” said Laura DiDio, Principal at ITIC.

Survey Results Summary:

  • 54% of IT managers and executives surveyed said more than two-thirds of their companies’ applications require the highest level of availability. Yet, 41% said would be satisfied with conventional 99 to 99.9% availability for their most critical applications, which does not qualify as a high-availability or continuous-availability solution.
  • 81% said the number of applications that demand high availability has increased in the past two-to-three years.
  • Of those who said they have been unable to meet service level agreements (SLAs), 72% can’t or don’t keep track of the cost and productivity losses created by downtime.

End User Comments:

  • “We are continually being asked to do more with less. We are now at a point, where the number of complex systems requiring expert knowledge has exceeded the headcount needed to maintain them … I am dreading vacation season.”
  • “We are an Application Service Provider. While our SLA guarantees are fairly modest – 98% uptime – We have found that we have to compensate our larger clients for any significant downtime. We had a half day outage a couple of years ago which cost us in excess of $40,000 in goodwill payouts to a handful of our clients, despite the fact that it was the first outage in 5 years.”
  • “If people knew the actual dollar value their customers represent, they’d already have the necessary software availability solutions in place to safeguard applications.”
  • “Most of the time, our biggest concerns center around keeping what we have running and available. Change usually costs money, and at the moment our budgets are simply in survival mode.”

Survey Methodology and Background

The ITIC survey was commissioned by Stratus Technologies in Maynard, MA. ITIC conducted a blind, non product-specific survey of 300 IT professionals and queried them on their application availability requirements, virtualization and service level agreement compliance. None of the respondents received any remuneration. The Web-based survey consisted of multiple choice and essay questions. ITIC analysts also conducted two dozen first person customer interviews to obtain detailed anecdotal data.

Respondents ranged from SMBs with 100 users to very large enterprises with over 100,000 end users. Industries represented: academic, advertising, aerospace, banking, communications, consumer products, defense, energy, finance, government, healthcare, insurance, IT services, legal, manufacturing, media and entertainment, telecommunications, transportation, and utilities. None of the survey respondents received any remuneration for their participation.

About Information Technology Intelligence Corporation (ITIC)

ITIC, founded in 2002, is a research and consulting firm in suburban Boston. It provides primary research on a wide variety of technology topics for vendors and enterprises. ITIC’s mission is to help its clients make sense of the technology and business events and provide tactical, practical and actionable advice. For more information visit ITIC’s website at https://itic-corp.com.

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Apple Gets More Entrenched in the Enterprise

ITIC Reports & Surveys / By

Apple Macintosh Enterprise Usage Continues to Grow

Apple Mac and OS X 10.x continue to make inroads in the enterprise.

ITIC’s 2009 Global IT and Technology Trends Survey shows that corporate enterprises continue to embrace the Apple Mac and OS X 10.x server operating system in numbers not seen since the late 1980s. ITIC polled IT managers and C-level executives at 700 corporations worldwide. Among the survey highlights:

  • Over two-thirds of the 700 survey respondents – 68% — indicated they are likely to allow their end users to deploy Macs as their corporate enterprise desktops in the next 12 months.
  • Almost one-quarter or 23% have a significant number of Macintoshes (> 50) present in their organizations. Apple Macs have long been a favorite of company executives, but the survey responses clearly indicate that Mac usage has filtered down to rank and file knowledge workers across the enterprise.
  • Half of all the survey respondents – 50% — said they plan to increase integration with existing Apple consumer products such as the iPhone to allow users to access corporate Email and other applications. This augurs well for the iPhone to establish itself as a viable alternative to Research In Motion’s (RIM) as a mobile device that allows users to access Email and other collaboration applications.

In summary, the ITIC/Sunbelt survey responses show that businesses will find themselves challenged to do more with fewer resources. The respondents also exhibited their practicality and resourcefulness in extending the lifespan of still-useful technologies like Windows XP. However those who have the need and the budget, will get an able assist from emerging technologies like virtualization – and for those that correctly configure and deploy them – Vista and the Mac and OS X 10.x

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ITIC Survey Indicates 35% of Companies Will Delay Network Upgrades for Lack of Money

ITIC Reports & Surveys / By

Server hardware, network infrastructure and storage upgrades are hardest hit; 97% of security upgrades are on course; nearly 40% of companies report their migrations will proceed on schedule.

BOSTON, MA (February 2, 2009) — Information Technology Intelligence Corporation (ITIC), a high-tech research and consulting firm, today announced that the global economic downturn will force 35% of corporations to delay or abandon crucial network upgrades during 2009.

The latest joint survey conducted by ITIC and Sunbelt Software polled over 700 C-level executives and IT managers at 700 corporations worldwide. The results showed that budgetary constraints and IT staffing issues topped users’ list of most daunting business challenges in the year ahead. The corporate respondents indicated they are understandably cautious about spending their precious capital expenditure monies and are only committing to crucial upgrades on an “as needed” basis.

Among the key survey findings:

  • Over one-third of the corporate respondents — 35% — said that the ongoing economic downturn had caused their companies to delay or abandon planned software, hardware and network infrastructure upgrades. However, an additional 26% of those polled — over one-quarter of companies — indicated they may yet be forced to shelve crucial migration plans due to lack of funds and a dearth of trained IT staff.
  • Of the 35% of companies that indicated they will delay or abandon certain planned upgrades — the network projects that will be most impacted are: server hardware (21%) and network infrastructure products such as routers (19%) and storage devices (15%).
  • Security remains the sole market segment that appears to be immune to the global economic downturn. An overwhelming 97% majority of the survey respondents said their security upgrades will proceed as planned, with only a very small 3% minority indicating they will defer security upgrades.
  • Overall, 39% of the survey respondents — nearly two out of five businesses — reported that their network migration and upgrade plans will proceed as planned in calendar 2009.
  • Some 27% of companies — or about three out of 10 businesses — reported their 2009 IT budgets will decrease; another 32% said their budgets will remain the same as 2008. Only 16% of the survey respondents reported their IT budgets will increase during the next 12 months.
  • Of the 16% of corporations that said budgets will increase — the largest portion — 23% said the budget increases would be modest — ranging from 5% to 15%. 8% reported their IT budgets would rise minimally — 1% to 5%. Large budget increases will be a rarity in 2009: only 1% of companies will see budgets go up by 20% to 30%, and 3% will see IT budgets increase by more than 30%.

Survey Methodology and Background

The Web-based survey included multiple choice and essay responses. In addition, ITIC and Sunbelt conducted two dozen first person customer interviews to validate the survey responses. ITIC and Sunbelt received no vendor sponsorship for this research and none of the survey respondents received any remuneration for their participation. Approximately 85% of the respondents came from North America; the remaining 15% came from 20 countries including Europe, Asia, Australia, New Zealand and South America.

About Information Technology Intelligence Corporation (ITIC)

ITIC, founded in 2002, is a research and consulting firm in suburban Boston. It provides primary research on a wide variety of technology topics for vendors and enterprises. ITIC’s mission is to help its clients make sense of the technology and business events and provide tactical, practical and actionable advice. For more information visit ITIC’s website at https://itic-corp.com.

About Sunbelt Software

Sunbelt Software was founded in 1994 and is a leading provider of Windows security and management software with product solutions in the areas of antispam and antivirus, antispyware, and vulnerability assessment. Leading products include the CounterSpy and VIPRE product lines. For more information, visit the company’s website at http://sunbeltsoftware.com.

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ITIC 2009 Global IT and Deployment Trends Survey

ITIC Reports & Surveys / By

Dear Santa: All I want for Christmas is a Virtual Data Center and a Big (Apple) Mac on my office desktop

The latest independent joint ITIC/Sunbelt Software survey found that demand and deployment for several technology sectors – most notably server and application virtualization – will remain robust in direct contrast to the bearish global economic climate.

ITIC and Sunbelt, polled C-level executives and network administrators at over 700 corporations worldwide on a variety of technology and business related topics. The Web-based survey included multiple choice and essay responses. In addition, ITIC and Sunbelt conducted two dozen first person customer interviews to validate the survey responses. ITIC and Sunbelt received no vendor sponsorship for this research. Additionally, no vendors had any influence or input into the survey or the results and none of the survey respondents received any remuneration for their participation. Approximately 85% of the respondents came from North America; the remaining 15% came from 20 countries including Europe, Asia, Australia, New Zealand and South America.

Virtualization Results

Virtually Yours: Server Virtualization Still a Top Priority in the Datacenter

Virtualization remains a high growth technology area, and the survey found that the market leaders – VMware, Microsoft and Citrix are all consolidating their positions. The survey also showed that while desktop and application virtualization will play a pivotal role for businesses – particularly enterprises with > 500 end users, the market will not materialize as quickly as it did for server virtualization. Among the survey highlights:

  • VMware remains the market leader but Microsoft’s Hyper-V is closing the gap. In response to a question in which we asked customers to select ALL the virtualization products they plan to use/deploy in 2009, nearly 60% said they plan to deploy VMware’s ESX Server (29%) or the free VMware Server (30%) . However, 52% of the respondents indicated they will use Microsoft’s Hyper-V or the older Microsoft Virtual Server; 37% of respondents indicated they will opt for Hyper-V compared with the remaining 15% who said they will use the older Virtual Server. This percentage is double the number of survey respondents who indicated they would use Microsoft hypervisor solutions when we polled users in a 2007 survey.
  • When it comes to Application Virtualization solutions, Microsoft’s App-V is the market leader, clearly beating VMware’s ThinApp by a 2-to-1 margin, which also came trailed Citrix’s XenApp 5.0. That said, it must be noted that thus far, only about 15% of the survey respondents have fully virtualized their applications across the entire enterprise.
  • It’s still very early in the game for the emerging application virtualization market: nearly two-thirds — 62% — of businesses have not yet even begun to deploy application virtualization in production environments (though pilot networks abound) or even chosen an application virtualization vendor.
  • Interestingly, in spite of cost constraints and pressures on IT budgets, only 7% of the survey respondents said they had attempted to renegotiate the terms and conditions of their virtualization licensing contracts to get better deals. Another 27% said they were studying the issue but had not yet made any definitive attempts to renegotiate and 66% said “No.”

Microsoft Vista: Most Users “Surprisingly” Satisfied

On the Windows desktop OS front, the ITIC/Sunbelt survey respondents gave Microsoft’s much maligned Vista operating system surprisingly high satisfaction ratings. We say “surprising” because Vista has gotten a lot of bad ink, much of it undeserved. Overall, 59% of the survey respondents said Vista was “Excellent”, “very good” or “good.” Despite these grades though, 45% of those polled said they would skip Vista and go directly to Windows 7 when that desktop OS ships in early 2010. Drilling further into the Vista responses:

  • To date, only 10% of the 700 survey respondents’ organizations have deployed Vista.
  • Windows XP is the primary desktop OS for 88% of the respondents.
  • Vista seems a victim of Windows XP’s success: Among the 45% of survey respondents who indicated they’ll skip Vista, the main reason(s) cited were cost constraints and the prevailing feeling that Windows XP is more than adequately meeting corporations’ business and technology needs.
  • The Vista experience was much better than anticipated for the 10% of companies that use Vista is their primary desktop OS: 27% rated Vista’s performance, reliability and security Excellent or Very Good; another 32% rated it “Good”, 19% said it was “Satisfactory.” Only 19% gave it an “Unsatisfactory” rating, mainly due to application incompatibility problems.

One recurring theme among the survey respondents was that since Windows XP is getting the job done, there’s no compelling business reason to upgrade to Vista.

“Windows XP, Windows 2003 and our other applications are more than adequate for now,” said one network administrator. “That means we will be investing very little in new infrastructure for the next couple of years. The constant upgrade progression for the sake of “keeping current” is dead for now,” he added.

The Vista desktop OS – all six flavors – is generally solid. The biggest impediment facing large enterprises deploying Vista is application incompatibility. This problem is especially acute in large enterprises that have dozens of third party applications associated with specific vertical markets. Consider the case of one such enterprise based in the Northeast with over 3,000 end users.

The company’s IT manager said his firm was 65% deployed onto Vista Business but, he noted, two of his crucial application vendors “have not yet migrated their products.” One is a financial application and the other is a GIS application. “They [the ISVs] have promised compliance by the end of 2009 so we plan to be 100% deployed on Vista by Q1 2010. At that time we’ll be ready to continue our normal replacement cycle (30% per year) deploying Windows 7 Service Pack 1 in late 2010!”

Apple Macintosh Enterprise Usage Continues to Grow

And finally, Apple Mac and OS X 10.x continue to make inroads in the enterprise.

  • Over two-thirds of the 700 survey respondents – 68% — indicated they are likely to allow their end users to deploy Macs as their corporate enterprise desktops in the next 12 months.
  • Almost one-quarter or 23% have a significant number of Macintoshes (> 50) present in their organizations. Apple Macs have long been a favorite of company executives, but the survey responses clearly indicate that Mac usage has filtered down to rank and file knowledge workers across the enterprise.
  • Half of all the survey respondents – 50% — said they plan to increase integration with existing Apple consumer products such as the iPhone to allow users to access corporate Email and other applications. This augurs well for the iPhone to establish itself as a viable alternative to Research In Motion’s (RIM) as a mobile device that allows users to access Email and other collaboration applications.

In summary, the ITIC/Sunbelt survey responses show that businesses will find themselves challenged to do more with fewer resources. The respondents also exhibited their practicality and resourcefulness in extending the lifespan of still-useful technologies like Windows XP. However those who have the need and the budget, will get an able assist from emerging technologies like virtualization – and for those that correctly configure and deploy them – Vista and the Mac and OS X 10.x

ITIC 2009 Global IT and Deployment Trends Survey Read More »

New 2009 Global IT and Technology Trends Forecast

ITIC Reports & Surveys / By

Mac Enterprise Usage Will Increase in 2009; Over two-thirds of businesses are open to letting end users deploy Macs as their corporate desktops; 50% of corporations will expand the integration between Macs and iPhones

BOSTON, MA (December 9, 2008) — The latest independent joint ITIC/Sunbelt Software survey found that Apple Mac hardware and Mac OS X 10.x continues to shine and steadily increase its presence among corporate enterprises.

The latest data, derived from an ITIC/Sunbelt Software Web-based survey that polled over 700 C-level executives and IT managers worldwide indicates that four-out-of five businesses have Macs present in their environment.

Apple Macintosh Enterprise Usage Continues to Grow

  • Over two-thirds of the 700 survey respondents – 68% – indicated they will allow their end users to deploy Macs as their corporate enterprise desktops in the next 12 months. This is double the 34% of companies that responded to this same question in the 2008 ITIC/Sunbelt Global IT and Technology Trends Survey.
  • Half of all the survey respondents – 50% – said they plan to increase integration with existing Apple consumer products such as the iPhone to allow users to access corporate Email and other applications. This indicates that customers perceive the combination of the Mac and the iPhone to be a viable alternative to the rival Research in Motion (RIM) Blackberry as a mobile device running key corporate applications.
  • Seven out of 10 businesses – 70% – rated the security of the Apple Mac and OS X as Excellent or Very Good.
  • An 82% majority of corporations rated the reliability of the Mac hardware and OS X 10.x as Excellent or Very Good.
  • Approximately 30% of the survey respondents are using Macs as the hardware platform to virtualize Microsoft’s Windows XP or the Vista operating system on Macintosh hardware in a virtual environment.

“Corporations are deploying Macs and the Mac OS X 10.x at a rate not seen since the late 1980s,” said Laura DiDio, principal at ITIC who conducted the survey. “If Mac hardware and OS X 10.x deployments continue at this rate – and we believe they will – Apple could realistically double its market share from its current rate of about 5% to 10% or more by 2011,” she added.

Survey Methodology and Background

The Web-based survey included multiple choice and essay responses. In addition, ITIC and Sunbelt conducted two dozen first person customer interviews to validate the survey responses. ITIC and Sunbelt received no vendor sponsorship for this research and none of the survey respondents received any remuneration for their participation. Approximately 85% of the respondents came from North America; the remaining 15% came from 20 countries including Europe, Asia, Australia, New Zealand and South America.

About Information Technology Intelligence Corporation (ITIC)

ITIC, founded in 2002, is a research and consulting firm in suburban Boston. It provides primary research on a wide variety of technology topics for vendors and enterprises. ITIC’s mission is to help its clients make sense of the technology and business events and provide tactical, practical and actionable advice. For more information visit ITIC’s website at https://itic-corp.com.

 

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