German IT body sees 2 p.c sector growth 2011

FRANKFURT, GERMANY: German technology and telecoms association Bitkom said it expects the sector's sales in Germany to pick up further in 2011, driven by higher corporate IT budgets and booming demand for mobile devices.

"IT services companies are particularly optimistic," Bitkom head August-Wilhelm Scheer said on a conference call on Monday, adding 90 per cent IT services companies polled by Bitkom saw higher revenues next year.

Bitkom expects industry sales in Germany to grow by 2 per cent to 144.5 billion euros ($192.3 billion) in 2011 after estimated sales growth of 1.4 per cent this year.

Scheer said companies had high hopes for cloud computing - a fast-growing way of selling services via the Web without physical software.

"Cloud computing will kick start significantly more investment in the coming years and establish completely new business models and services," Scheer said.

Cloud computing sales are expected to rise to 8.2 billion euros by 2015 from 1.1. billion euros in 2010 according to Bitkom.

The German IT body also said two thirds of companies polled by Bitkom were seeking to create new jobs in 2011.

Currently, some 28,000 jobs in the German IT sector are vacant. Bitkom reiterated that the industry still lacked enough trained staff and called for legislation that allowed more skilled foreigners to work in Germany.