No. 2 was a tie between virtualization and Web site design. Following as the fourth most selected item was internal collaboration/technology tools, listed by 12 percent, with cloud computing listed by 11 percent. Company-branded social media sites was the category named by 9 percent. That was followed 1 percent that selected the infamous "other." Multiple responses were permitted. It's difficult to say if I'm surprised by the relatively low placement of SaaS, but then as hot as that is, getting things updated is usually a far bigger part of the IT process than implementing a new platform. I think for a lot of companies, virtualization is the big new technology frontier. I also got another endorsement for 2010 as a year of hardware revolution from Randy Johnston, partner with the K2 consulting group. Last week’s issue noted that Hasso Plattner, SAP co-founder, was predicting major changes this year. Both listed the emergence of the cell telephone as the primary device for computing and multi-core processors that can operate in truly parallel form as important developments.
POSTPONED UPGRADES TO RESUME?
Software and hardware upgrades led the list of IT projects that CIOs said they would pick up again as the economy improves. The question put to 1,400 CIOs by Robert Half Technology was "Which IT projects, if any, did you put on hold in 2009 due to the economy that you plan to implement post-recession?" I suppose “post-recession” is the uncertain word, but assuming we're in that state, 37 percent of the respondents said they would move forward with postponed software or hardware upgrades.
