REGIONAL SNAPSHOT
A year ago, the garden
looked very rosy in Germany – global
Germany. Consumer buying,
telecoms and broadband
issues start to impact IT
had risen and a lot of
investment was being placed
by German companies.
Since then it seems that,
I
t’s long been known as one of helped create stronger employment
Europe’s strongest markets, but it growth, improving consumer demand
certainly is an interesting, not to from a temporary setback caused by the
mention curious, time to be looking rise in the VAT rate in Germany at the
while the market is still
at Germany and its economics and beginning of 2007.
strong, the world economy
business issues. In the IT market itself, the pattern is
has intervened to limit
Financially, the situation with the similar: Peter O’Neill, principal analyst
potential. Resource issues
rising euro is perhaps more troubling at researcher Forrester’s Munich office
than previously; Germany seems to be believes that consolidation seems to
have been rising, but the
one of the best placed countries to deal be the current name of the German
powerhouse in the mid-
with it, but while the dollar/euro rate game. “The German ICT market is
market remains, and it still
seems to be deteriorating a lot faster than über-mature, very slow to change and
is SAP’s home base...
some expected so inflation has picked conservative. Growth is between 2% to
up to 3.5%. Consequently, the European 3% per year, while the GDP is around
Central Bank has been reluctant to cut 2.6%. German buyers are conservative.
rates. Yet while most markets remain There are only consolidation projects.
nervous about possible fallouts, Germany However, virtualisation is having a
continues to attain strong levels in big success as it enables to optimise
exports particularly to Asia. resources. The public sector is investing
Germany’s ICT market has been going heavily in Open Source solutions.”
up at an impressive rate, according to An IT Europa survey earlier thgis
EITO figures. In 2004, it was measured at year found that the top 700 integrators
€63,816m; now in 2008 it is €72,600m. in Europe achieved collective sales
The Economic Global Surveys Trends of €107bn, Germany was found to
Survey, released at the end of last have the highest overall growth rate at
year, reported a general slowdown 18.45%. Interestingly, although it had
in European economies, going from the highest growth rate, Germany was
2.8% in 2006, to 2.6% in 2007 before still behind France and the UK when
being forecast to drop to 1.9% in 2008. looking at where the largest integrators
Germany however, was one of the few were based, so still has a preference for
countries emerging with some strong mid-sized IT businesses.
positives. Market labour reforms have Dirk Krause, Technical Director at
60 8020 EUROPA JUNE 2008
60,61.indd 1 13/6/08 09:28:26
Page 1 |
Page 2 |
Page 3 |
Page 4 |
Page 5 |
Page 6 |
Page 7 |
Page 8 |
Page 9 |
Page 10 |
Page 11 |
Page 12 |
Page 13 |
Page 14 |
Page 15 |
Page 16 |
Page 17 |
Page 18 |
Page 19 |
Page 20 |
Page 21 |
Page 22 |
Page 23 |
Page 24 |
Page 25 |
Page 26 |
Page 27 |
Page 28 |
Page 29 |
Page 30 |
Page 31 |
Page 32 |
Page 33 |
Page 34 |
Page 35 |
Page 36 |
Page 37 |
Page 38 |
Page 39 |
Page 40 |
Page 41 |
Page 42 |
Page 43 |
Page 44 |
Page 45 |
Page 46 |
Page 47 |
Page 48 |
Page 49 |
Page 50 |
Page 51 |
Page 52 |
Page 53 |
Page 54 |
Page 55 |
Page 56 |
Page 57 |
Page 58 |
Page 59 |
Page 60 |
Page 61 |
Page 62 |
Page 63 |
Page 64 |
Page 65 |
Page 66 |
Page 67 |
Page 68