SMB IT Survey

We like to share content that we think is useful or interesting for our users. We also like to benchmark our own IT choices and thought our users might want to as well. So, here are some interesting highlights from a Spiceworks report entitled: State of SMB IT 1H 2013. SMBs have seen their budgets increase in the last six months, leading to ramped up spending on end-user devices and cloud services.
 

Four key survey findings:

Budgets & Spending

IT budgets have seen a dramatic boost in all but the largest SMBs.

• The average annual IT budget is now $192,000 – up $30,000 from the second half of 2012.
• SMBs with fewer than 250 employees are seeing the biggest budget increases, while companies with 250 to 999 employees show a decline. However, hiring remains largely flat, with the bulk of the increased budget going to new end-user hardware purchases and, to a lesser extent, new cloud-based and hosted IT services.

Cloud

Cloud-based and hosted IT services have found a home in SMB.

• While cloud services appear to have held steady over the last six months, with just over 60% of respondents using them, survey results suggest that cloud services are headed for a new peak of 66% in the second half of 2013. The smaller the SMB, the more likely they are to be using cloud services. Smaller SMBs are also using the greatest number of cloud services.

Virtualization

Server virtualization has reached new heights.

• Adoption of server virtualization continues to increase unabated, with 72% of respondents now using server virtualization – an increase of seven percentage points since the second half of 2012. What’s more, a full 80% plan to be using sever virtualization within the next six months. EMEA leads in this category, with 80% average usage compared to 73% in North America. Unlike with cloud services, however, the larger the SMB, the more likely they are to be using server virtualization.

Mobile

Tablets are quickly gaining ground in SMB networks and budgets.

• Tablets continue to be the driving force in mobile tech, with 59% of respondents reporting that they have tablets on their network. This fi gure is up six percentage points from just six months ago, and it’ll likely continue to rise; 70% of respondents predict they’ll have tablets on their network in the second half of 2013. While smartphone adoption has leveled off , survey results suggest that those devices are headed for a new peak this year as well.

 
We thank Spiceworks for allowing us to share their results.
 

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