With everything that is happening globally, it seems that the ICT industry in Australia is all set for an interesting new year. Unfortunately it is hard to tell if it will be a good year considering the uncertainty in the air that is causing hesitation to invest in the industry.
Though Australia is surviving the global economic problems better than most countries, it does not mean that local business owners have reason not to be cautious. While the Australian economy has proven to be quite resilient over the past few years, we remain wary in the face of ongoing instability in other countries.
Forecasts show that ICT spending is expected to reach $653 billion this year. That is an increase of a little over 10% on 2011 spending. However, if the current trends continue, this growth will slowly decline in the next few years - but is still likely to be around 9% by 2015.
Looking at some specific predictions; cloud computing in the mining industry will experience a boost this year. In particular, data collection and storage will expand in the cloud giving investors the ability to more closely follow the progress of their mining company interests. There will also be a trend for communications to move towards the cloud as well as increasing use of the pay-as-you-go commercial model.
The mobile enterprise industry will also be concentrating more on security issues. Developers will need to work hard to deal with the growing variety of attacks that threatens us through mobile technology. This increasing security demand in the mobile industry in Australia will likely propel them at a great rate towards digitization. The workspace will start to experience the benefits of mobility - as we see more and more smart phones being utilized. Growth in mobile application development is expected to continue rising.
The increasing use of outsourcing by Australian companies in the past few years has given business the confidence to use this approach for individual projects as well as key business functions. This maturity will see them expecting more from service providers in terms of business and operational metrics to measure the growth of their investment. In particular, business value KPIs are now a common clause in service contracts.
To summarise, there seems likely to be a growing focus on cloud computing and security this 2012. It will be interesting to see how the shortage of local manpower we have experienced in the past few years will be affected by this. Hopefully there will be enough growth there to support the business sector’s move to greater technological heights.
Concentrate on the things that are trending in the outsource industry. IT related projects are commonly outsourced. There is a larger pool of talented professionals across the ocean that you can tap into and hire for specific periods.
There are many countries, such as the Philippines, China, Russia and India, who have invested in training IT professionals.
At 3W, we recognize the potential of our closest neighbour, the Philippines:
1. They have excellent English language skills.
2. They are more likely to understand Australian culture due to their own Western ideology - a result of many years of American colonization.
3. They are extremely patient, service oriented and competent individuals.
If you decide to give outsourcing a try, make sure to put your trust in a company that will serve your needs. Open communication, great talent pool and highly professional systems are among the things that you should look for.
