2002 Fujitsu Consulting ITSM Survey Reveals Shift In Buying Patterns, Corporate Expectations and Diligence.

Business Editors

BOSTON--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Sept. 24, 2002

Fujitsu Consulting:

Specific Technology Foci Have Shifted; Metrics and Analysis Efforts

are Split

While technology-spending patterns in the Information Technology Service Management (ITSM) market have evolved in the past year, the majority of costs continue to be associated with people rather than with hardware or software, according to the first part of a survey released today by Fujitsu Consulting.

Thirty percent of respondents in the Fujitsu Consulting survey indicated that 60-80% of their IT costs can be directly attributed to human interaction.

The findings in Fujitsu Consulting's annual ITSM survey reveal the IT focus for business continues to shift, and spending patterns reflect the evolution. Although Customer Relationship Management still rates fairly high on respondents' lists (34%), there is a move to spend on enhancing the function of currently-in-place technology, such as IT process improvement (52%) or infrastructure improvement (51%). Dollar allocation for security improvement (38%) continues to rise.

"As one would expect, many of the initial findings follow economic fluctuations, but we did find a number of more surprising results regarding spending patterns and metrics trends," said Hal Dally, Director, IT Service Management, at Fujitsu Consulting, who made his comments at the itSMF USA Conference 2002. "Security spending has not jumped in the way it might have, but this indicates organizations are paying more attention to the processes involved in using the technology they already have on hand."

Last year's study noted a significant lack in activity measurement and other metrics, and 2002 finds them still lacking, although there are some bright spots. Only 32% of IT organizations regularly measure and publish Key Performance or Business Indicators (KPIs /KBIs). Fifty-five percent of respondents do not have an accurate inventory. On a more positive note, some areas of analysis are improving, with 67% of respondents regularly conducting Root Cause Analysis - a big improvement over last year.

ITSM is an evolution of IT planning; a methodology designed to enhance the interaction between an organization's various business competencies and IT capabilities.

The second part of the survey will be release on the coming weeks. For more information on the survey and results, please contact the spokesperson listed below.

About Fujitsu Consulting

Fujitsu Consulting is a trusted global provider of management and technology consulting services with more than 8,000 employees in 70 offices worldwide. Fujitsu Consulting works with companies to improve their business performance through the delivery of technology-enabled solutions, including Portfolio Management, Application Outsourcing, IT Business Management, Content Management and Business Analytics. Fujitsu Consulting is a subsidiary of the $38 billion Fujitsu group. For more information, visit Fujitsu Consulting on the web at consulting.Fujitsu.com.