Synopsis
This report presents the findings from a survey of 128 energy companies regarding their Information & Communications Technology (ICT) budgets and staff allocation. The survey investigates how energy companies currently allocate their ICT budgets across the core areas of ICT spend, namely hardware, software, IT services, communications and consulting.
Scope
Understand how ICT budgets are set to change in 2013 in terms of their overall size.
Appreciate how budgets are allocated across the core elements of ICT spend, including hardware, software, services, communications and consulting.
Learn how ICT money is being spent in areas such as the data centre, applications, IT management and the network.
Establish how IT staff are typically allocated within energy companies.
Gain insight into with whom energy companies plan to spend their ICT money.
Summary
Why was the report written?
In order to provide a depth of insight into ICT vendors’ and service providers’ potential customers.
What is the current market landscape and what is changing?
With the economy showing signs of recovery, energy companies are increasing their ICT investments in 2013. Hardware remains a key area of focus for enterprises in this sector, with energy companies increasing their budget allocations for data centres by X% in 2013 compared to 2012.
What are the key drivers behind recent market changes?
Energy companies’ requirement for high-performance computing, which helps them decrease the time required to retrieve and analyse data, and generate forecasting models is influencing the demand for data centres.
What makes this report unique and essential to read?
Kable Market Research Market Research has invested significant resources in order to interview CIOs and IT managers about their IT Budgets. Very few IT analyst houses will have interviewed 120+ ICT decision makers in the energy industry in H2 2012.
Reasons To Buy
The global energy sector has been facing major challenges such as the decline in crude oil demand, price fluctuations, and delays in major energy investments owing to global economic uncertainties. Kable Market Research’s survey shows that in the current economic scenario, energy companies are planning to make reasonable investments in ICT to become more competitive.
As reliable communications are a pre-requisite for efficient operations in the energy sector, it is becoming imperative for companies to develop robust communications infrastructures in order to improve productivity.
Energy companies’ require high-performance computing, which helps them decrease the time required to retrieve and analyse data, and generate forecasting models leading to intelligent business decisions. Consequently, these companies have increased their budget allocations for data centres by 2% in 2013 compared to 2012.
The service support and help desk function is witnessing high average allocation of 28%, as energy companies are keen to respond quickly to conditions that disrupt business services, and also to improve incident and problem management processes.
Energy companies are spending a major portion of their IT services budgets on application development & integration, which stems from the fact that companies are planning to develop custom applications to suit the changing requirements and regulations in the energy sector.
Table of Contents
1 Trends in ICT budgets
1.1 Introduction
1.2 Survey demographics
1.3 ICT budget changes
1.4 ICT budget allocation by core technology area
1.5 ICT budget allocation by function
1.6 ICT spending by entity
1.7 IT staff distribution
2 Detailed ICT budget allocations
2.1 Introduction
2.2 Hardware budget breakdown
2.3 Software budget breakdowns
2.4 Third party IT services expenditure
2.5 Telecommunications budget
3 Summary
3.1 Energy companies are planning to make significant ICT investments to achieve operational efficiencies and comply with stringent regulations
4 Appendix
4.1 Definitions
4.2 Further reading
4.3 Contact the authors
List Of Tables
Table 1: Energy – enterprise ICT survey geographic breakdown
Table 2: Energy – enterprise ICT survey breakdown by size band (number of employees)
Table 3: Recent and expected ICT budget changes among energy companies
Table 4: Energy companies’ (external) ICT budget allocation, 2012 and 2013
Table 5: Energy companies’ ICT budget allocation by function, 2012 and 2013
Table 6: Energy companies’ (external) ICT budget allocation by entity, 2012 and 2013
Table 7: Average allocation of full-time IT staff members in energy companies
Table 8: Energy companies’ average hardware budget allocation
Table 9: Average allocation of software budgets in energy companies
Table 10: Energy companies’ average software budget allocation by technology
Table 11: Energy companies’ average IT services budget allocation
Table 12: Energy companies’ average IT consulting services budget allocation
Table 13: Energy companies’ average telecommunications budget allocation
List Of Figures
Figure 1: Energy – enterprise ICT survey geographic breakdown
Figure 2: Energy – enterprise ICT survey breakdown by size band (number of employees)
Figure 3: Recent and expected ICT budget changes among energy companies
Figure 4: Energy companies’ (external) ICT budget allocation, 2012 and 2013
Figure 5: Energy companies’ ICT budget allocation by function, 2012 and 2013
Figure 6: Energy companies’ ICT budget allocation by entity, 2012 and 2013
Figure 7: Average allocation of full-time IT staff members in energy companies
Figure 8: Energy companies’ average hardware budget allocation
Figure 9: Average allocation of software budgets in energy companies
Figure 10: Energy companies’ average software budget allocation by technology
Figure 11: Energy companies’ average IT services budget allocation
Figure 12: Energy companies’ average IT consulting services budget allocation
Figure 13: Energy companies’ average telecommunications budget allocation
