Enterprise IT spending in Southeast Asia will reach $62 billion by 2018, with growth driven by top spenders Singapore and Malaysia. according to forecasts from Gartner.
"Some might argue that given recent political, financial and climate challenges, Southeast Asia is a risky proposition," said Venecia Liu, research VP at Gartner. "However, Gartner believes that Southeast Asia's economic development and growing consumer demand mean that its growth potential outweighs the risk."
In particular, Gartner estimates that enterprise spending on IT products and services in Singapore will be $19.1 billion (about S$24 billion) in 2015. Compared with other mature markets in the region, such as Australia, this intensity of IT spending is high relative to Singapore's gross national output and population.
The dominant sectors in 2015 will be communications, media and services; banking and securities; government; and manufacturing — together accounting for 70% of total spend.
In communications, media and services, expected areas for technology investment include analytics and equipment as well as investments in Wi-Fi hotspots and cloud computing.
Also, Singapore’s financial services sector is the focus of much new investment in information technology, especially as Singapore's banking system prepares itself for digitalization.
Further, the government sector looms large in Singapore's ICT landscape as it prioritizes g-cloud, big data, analytics and information security.