Global computing hardware spend to rise 5.7 percent in 2010 claims Gartner

According to Gartner, robust consumer spending on mobile PCs will drive hardware spending in 2010. The analyst forecasts that enterprise hardware spending will grow again in 2010, but it will remain below its 2008 level through 2014. Spending on storage is said to be the fastest growth in terms of enterprise spending as the volume of enterprise data that needs to be stored continues to increase. Gartner suggests that near term spending on servers will be concentrated on lower end servers; longer term, server spending will be curtailed by virtualisation, consolidation and, potentially, cloud computing. George Shiffler, research director at Gartner, said: "Computing hardware suffered the steepest spending decline of the four major IT spending category segments in 2009. However, it is now forecast to enjoy the joint strongest rebound in 2010. Consumer PC spending will contribute nearly four percentage points of hardware spending growth in 2010, powered by strong consumer spending on mobile PCs. Additionally, professional PC spending will contribute just over one percentage point of spending growth in 2010 as organisations begin their migration to Windows 7 toward the end of the year."