Expect the credit crunch, housing and foreclosure rates rise and consumer confidence tumbled and other factors will affect the IT industry. Some indicators show that technology spending will be hit. Forrester Research to the United States in 2008 to purchase technology equipment and services, the amount of growth forecast cut to 4.6%, well below its October forecast of 8%.

Is expected to enterprises for computers and telecommunications equipment expenditure will be especially cautious, prompting technology company CEOs to shareholders warned that next year, customers will not like in 2007 as a generous giver. Cisco CEO John Chambers last month warned that the credit crunch suffered the pain of the financial industry to reduce IT spending, Cisco's performance in the short-term could lead to slower growth. Cisco's stock price plummeted remark drag. Last week, Hewlett-Packard executives predicted revenue growth in fiscal year 2009 may be only 5%, lower than the 2008 estimate of 6.9%. While HP ended October 31, 2007 for fiscal year 2007 operating income increased by 14%. IDC had predicted that the global IT market growth next year, 5.5-6%, lower than forecast growth rate of 6.9% this year.

The chief technology officer, has projected that many companies will only be a slight increase in technology spending. United States Information Management Association (Society for Information Management, SIM) has recently conducted a survey showed that although 61% of technology managers said their 2007 budget will be higher than last year, but only 49% of people predicted the budget will be higher than in 2008 year.

Nearly one third of people said that its 2008 budget will be flat this year, 21% is expected to be lower than this year. This result is almost identical to a recent survey by InformationWeek. In the latter survey, only 49% expect IT budgets will grow next year, and 28% of people are expected flat this year, 16% of people are expected to decline.

The expected slowdown in IT spending is not all bad. For example, it will enable enterprises have a stronger bargaining power, chief technology officer. Forrester's Bartels predicts: "(next year) will fit in the bargain." He predicted that next year the U.S. computer and peripherals expenditure increased by only 2%, communications equipment and IT services expenditure increased by only 3%, IT outsourcing expenditure increased by 6%. The software will be the IT market, the least-affected areas, is expected to grow 8%.

The economic situation of uncertainty, making forecasting more difficult. IDC predicts that more IT companies will use software-as-a-service (SaaS) model, and tried to use online communities and other Web 2.0 trends.

However, MGI Research predicted that next year if the economy into the doldrums, SaaS companies sell software licenses than companies subject to a greater blow. MGI forecasts, SaaS companies need to undertake more infrastructure costs, and if the economic downturn period is longer than nine months, the company will reduce the number of employees subscribe.

IT industries are endorsed by a prediction: firms in 2008 will be more concerned with developing economies. Forrester said it expects next year's Asia-Pacific IT purchases will reach 535 billion U.S. dollars, an increase of 14% in 2007 increased by 19%. The United States remained the largest buyer of IT is expected to reach 533 billion U.S. dollars this year. IT spending in China this year is expected to reach 117 billion U.S. dollars, Japan is the 173 billion U.S. dollars. Within a few years China will surpass Japan to become the second highest IT spending countries.

Upcoming New Year, most corporate IT budgets have been doing a good job. More cautious IT spending plans of those companies next year should be more calm flies. Those who plan to do more radical enterprise, if the economy does not appear to improve, it may be at risk.