European IT spending ‘continues to be recession-proof’

According to figures from Gartner, IT spending in Europe will total $1.1 trillion in 2024, an increase of 9.3% on this year.

Software and IT services are expected to enjoy the highest spending increase in 2024, while in the data centre market new spending continues to skew toward cloud options which is expected to grow 27%.

In terms of where European CIOs priorities lie, enhancing cybersecurity spending in the cloud and planning for AI and generative AI are identified as key factors. Spending on security and risk management is expected to reach around $56 billion in 2024, a 16% bump.

“Despite a conflated economic situation, IT spending in Europe continues to be recession-proof,” said John-David Lovelock, Distinguished VP Analyst at Gartner. “CIOs in Europe who pursued the “growth at all costs” strategy for over a decade, are now shifting the emphasis of ongoing IT projects toward cost control, efficiencies and automation, while curtailing IT initiatives with longer ROIs.

“AI has also added a new level of concern around security ensuring that their systems are wrapped before hackers get near their sensitive data.”

Some of the growth in IT services is apparently due to talent shortages within IT departments in Europe. “There is a migration of IT skills away from the enterprise IT department toward technology and service providers (TSPs). CIOs do not have the employees nor the talents to do all the work required and turn to IT services firms to fill in the gaps,” added Lovelock.

The UK, Germany and France will represent 51% of total IT spending in Europe in 2024, projected to come in at $588 billion collectively, up 9.8% from 2023.

In terms of devices, while businesses and consumers are expected to increase their spending next year the level of IT spending in this segment is not estimated to go back to 2021 levels until 2027. Austria, Ireland and Finland are projected to experience the biggest ‘bounce back’ in consumer spending in 2024.

Here is Gartner’s full segment breakdown:

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