Gartner Highlights Key Predictions for IT Organizations in 2007 and Beyond

STAMFORD, Conn., December 13, 2006 — Gartner, Inc. released today 10 key predictions that showcase the trends and events that will change the nature of business and IT in 2007 and beyond.

These predictions are for general technology areas rather than specific to industries or roles within an organization. The predictions are intended to compel high-tech companies and IT professionals within enterprises to action and position themselves to take advantage of the coming changes, and not be damaged by them.

“Selected from across our research areas as the most compelling and critical predictions, the trends and topics they address this year indicate that priorities, markets, cultures and technologies are all rapidly changing,” said Daryl Plummer, managing vice president and Gartner Fellow. “These changes will require that IT and business change their approach to delivering and quantifying value. IT professionals must examine these predictions for opportunities to increase their support of consumer-driven requirements and their ability to help the business deliver stronger services to those customers.”

This year’s predictions include:

Through 2009, market share for the top 10 IT outsourcers will decline to 40.0% (from 43.5% now), equaling a revenue shift of $5.4 billion. As market share declines, some key outsourcing vendors will cease to exist in their current named form. The reduced number of large contracts, increased amount of competition and reduction in contract sizes have placed great pressure on outsourcers, which will have to “sink or swim” based on support for selective outsourcing and disciplined multisourcing competencies.

Only one Asia/Pacific-based service provider will make the global top 20 through 2010. The number of global players in consulting that come from Asia is relatively small. This will limit the ability of the Asian juggernaut to grow revenue streams rapidly and become global leaders.

Blogging and community contributors will peak in the first half of 2007. Given the trend in the average life span of a blogger and the current growth rate of blogs, there are already more than 200 million ex-bloggers. Consequently, the peak number of bloggers will be around 100 million at some point in the first half of 2007.

By 2009, corporate social responsibility (CSR) will be a higher board- and executive-level priority than regulatory compliance. Regulation has become a key issue for government and the corporate world, with the aim of ensuring more-responsible behavior. However, the need for companies to be socially responsible to their employees, customers and shareholders is growing as well. The future will see corporate boards and executives make this social dynamic a more-critical priority.

By the end of 2007, 75% of enterprises will be infected with undetected, financially motivated, targeted malware that evaded their traditional perimeter and host defenses. The threat environment is changing — financially motivated, targeted attacks are increasing, and automated malware-generation kits allow simple creation of thousands of variants quickly — but our security processes and technologies haven’t kept up.

Vistawill be the last major release of Microsoft Windows. The next generation of operating environments will be more modular and will be updated incrementally. The era of monolithic deployments of software releases is nearing an end. Microsoft will be a visible player in this movement, and the result will be more-flexible updates to Windows and a new focus on quality overall.

By 2010, the average total cost of ownership (TCO) of new PCs will fall by 50%. The growing importance and focus on manageability, automation and reliability will provide a welcome means of differentiating PCs in a market that is increasingly commoditized. Many of the manageability and support tools will be broadly available across multiple vendors. However, vendors that can leverage these tools further and can graduate from claims of “goodness” to concrete examples of cost savings will have a market advantage.

By 2010, 60% of the worldwide cellular population will be “trackable” via an emerging “follow-me Internet.” Local regulations have arisen to protect users’ privacy, but growing demands for national safety and civil protection are relaxing some of the initial privacy limitations. Marketing incentives will also push users to forgo privacy concerns, and many other scenarios will enable outsiders to track their users.

Through 2011, enterprises will waste $100 billion buying the wrong networking technologies and services. Enterprises are missing out on opportunities to build a network that would put them at a competitive advantage. Instead, they follow outdated design practices and collectively will waste at least $100 billion in the next five years.

By 2008, nearly 50% of data centers worldwide will lack the necessary power and cooling capacity to support high-density equipment. With higher densities of processors proliferating, problems in this area continue to grow. Although the power and cooling challenge of high-density computer equipment will persist in the short term, a convergence of innovative technologies will begin to mitigate the problem by 2010.

These 10 key trends are part of a series of “Gartner Predicts” research, which also includes top predictions for specific roles across the eight Gartner for IT Leaders programs and for key vertical industries. The entire series of “Gartner Predicts” research includes nearly 50 reports that discuss the major trends that will affect IT users, high-tech and telecom companies and most industries in 2007 and beyond. Each year, Gartner analysts in every research area converge to identify, debate and develop these trends to help companies with their tactical IT planning and investment decisions in the short term and their overall IT strategy in the long term. The Gartner Predicts 2007 Special Reports series are available on Gartner’s Web site at www.gartner.com.

More information on these top predictions for general technology areas is available in the Gartner Special Report “Gartner’s Top Predictions for IT Organizations and Users, 2007 and Beyond” at www.gartner.com/DisplayDocument?ref=g_search&id=498768&subref=simplesearch. The top predictions for IT leaders can be found at www.gartner.com/DisplayDocument?ref=g_search&id=498769&subref=simplesearch. The top predictions for key industries can be found at www.gartner.com/DisplayDocument?ref=g_search&id=498770&subref=simplesearch.

About Gartner:
Gartner, Inc. (NYSE: IT) delivers the technology-related insight necessary for its clients to make the right decisions, every day. Gartner serves 10,000 organizations, including chief information officers and other senior IT executives in corporations and government agencies, as well as technology companies and the investment community. The Company consists of Gartner Research, Gartner Executive Programs, Gartner Consulting and Gartner Events. Founded in 1979, Gartner is headquartered in Stamford, Connecticut, U.S.A., and has 3,700 associates, including 1,200 research analysts and consultants in 75 countries worldwide. For more information, visit www.gartner.com.

Contact Information

Christy Pettey

Gartner, Inc.

Contact via E-mail