Analyst Digest: Rebound is on and CRM stars

During the week of Nov. 3 to Nov. 7, analysts reported that IT and telecommunications spending has begun to pick up, mobile phone shipments have risen, and CRM is one of the fastest growing markets.

Here is a sampling of the data analysts compiled:

— IT and telecommunication spending has begun a rebound which will carry through into 2004, according to IDC. Worldwide IT spending is set for 5 percent growth to $916 billion in 2004, while spending on telecommunication services will show 4 percent growth to $1 trillion.

— Java is the favored language for developing Web services, according to an Evans Data Corp. survey of 400 developers. Of six categories surveyed, Java was rated best in five — flow control, syntax, object/memory separation, easy access to libraries and tight integration with XML (Extensible Markup Language), but was rated second to C# for tight integration with SOAP (Simple Object Access Protocol).

— worldwide mobile phone shipments have risen sharply on strong demand from emerging markets, according to IDC. In the third quarter of 2003, mobile phone shipments reached 130.1 million units, 21.2 percent higher than in the same quarter last year, and 14 percent higher than in the second quarter.

— Verizon Communications Inc., China Telecom Corp. and Nippon Telegraph and Telephone Corp. (NTT) will be the three biggest capital spenders on fixed-line telecommunications between now and 2007, each spending about US$40 billion during that time, according to Pyramid Research. The top 24 carriers in the world will spend a combined $65 billion each year in this sector, Pyramid said.

— CRM (customer relationship management) software is one of the fastest-growing markets at the moment, following a serious slump in 2002 according to Wendover-Global Insight’s IT Spending Index. Other hot IT areas are data warehousing and management, consulting services, maintenance and facilities software, manufacturing software, and Internet/intranet services.