Gartner anticipates strong growth despite a pause in new investments.
Worldwide IT spending will reach 5.43 trillion dollars in 2025, a 7.9 percent increase compared to 2024, according to the latest forecasts from analyst firm Gartner. Data centers, in particular, show strong growth of 42.4 percent due to investments in AI infrastructure.
Pause Due to Uncertainty, genAI Spending Rises
“There is a sense of uncertainty,” Gartner analyst John-David Lovelock tells ITProToday. “Companies are limiting new spending due to current economic and geopolitical risks.” However, ongoing initiatives around generative AI are not being halted. Spending on AI servers is expected to triple by 2027 compared to traditional servers. In 2021, such spending was virtually nonexistent, but now it surpasses that of
Software and services are growing slower than last year, but remain important. Companies are increasingly seeking “plug-and-play” solutions rather than complex custom work. The focus is shifting from promise to proven functionality.
AI Remains the Competitive Advantage
A Gartner survey reveals that 62 percent of business leaders see AI as a decisive competitive advantage for the next decade. However, only a quarter of companies expect to complete their projects faster than planned. “The decline of GenAI is in expectations, not in spending or interest”, says Lovelock. “Companies and service providers are spending on GenAI; they are simply adjusting their expectations downward.”
Lovelock emphasizes: “Budgets remain available. But investment decisions are being strategically postponed, especially in hardware, where prices and supply remain unstable.”
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