Survey: Businesses Use Managed IT for Security, Storage, Disaster Recovery

Buyers of managed IT services will focus on security, storage and disaster recovery services in 2007, according to research commissioned by the Computing Technology Industry Association (CompTIA).

One-third of the 322 organizations participating in the Harris Interactive Inc. survey – all current users of managed services – said they plan to invest or upgrade their spending in managed security this year. The same percentage of organizations, 33 percent, said they plan to invest or upgrade spending in storage, backup and disaster recovery services.

Other managed services spending priorities for 2007 include Web or e-mail hosting (27 percent); network monitoring and administration (25 percent); and software-as-a-service and application subscriptions (20 percent).

Forty percent of the organizations said they are investing in managed IT services because they do not have the in-house skills to manage certain IT services. Another 30 percent said it is less expensive for them to have an outside party manage certain IT services and 21 percent said they chose the managed services model because it allows them to focus on their core competency.

The companies surveyed ranged from small businesses (1-20 employees with annual revenue of less than $5 million) to large enterprises (1,000 or more employees and $250 million or more in annual revenue). The mean amount spent by the companies on managed services in the past year was $243,855.

Computing Technology Industry Association www.comptia.org  

Harris Interactive Inc. www.harrisinteractive.com