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Although some industries will put on hold or even cancel their investments in information systems following the SARS outbreak, government, health and education sectors will be the two biggest consumers of the market and boost demand, industry experts and executives said yesterday.
"Information technology (IT) spending will see a fair growth this year, despite the outbreak of SARS in China," said Chen Lihui, vice-president of CCW Research Co Ltd, a major domestic information market analysis firm.
The disease, which has claimed almost 300 lives on the Chinese mainland, has led to the closure of some factories, offices and shopping malls specializing in the IT business.
According to a report by CCW Research based on a survey among 300 senior information officers (CIOs) in 11 industries including government, education, finance, health, transportation and commerce, about 5 percent of the respondents said they would cancel their IT spending and 13.5 percent said they would postpone their procurement in this quarter.
About 70 percent of the CIOs in the survey conducted in the second half of April said they would not alter their IT budgets. And their attitude towards the outlook for the second half of the year remained optimistic.
About 78 percent of the CIOs said there would be no change to their IT budget for the second half of 2003.
Only 1.2 percent of the respondents said they would cancel their procurement plans and 3.2 percent said they would postpone them.
"The suppressed procurement demands in some industries will come out in the second half of the year," said Chen.
He added that demand from government, education and health sectors will head the rebound of IT spending.
Chen said that SARS (severe acute respiratory syndrome) would enhance the awareness of government departments to the need for speedy and efficient reaction to emergencies. It will also encourage greater use of the Internet for conducting their business, all of which will accelerate government projects.
Wang Guixin, a spokeswoman for China's biggest computer manufacturer the Legend Group, said her company would pay more attention to the demands of health organizations, although its strengths mainly lay in the sectors of government, education and finance.
She believes that SARS may affect Legend's business in this quarter and the Beijing market, but the impact in other regions and during the second half would not be significant.
However, the demands for information systems from those badly hit industries may postpone or even reduce, experts predict.
(China Daily May 22, 2003)
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