Advertisment

Australian SMBs gain strategic importance

author-image
Sharath Kumar
New Update

NEWDELHI, INDIA: Zinnov, a leading market expansion and globalization advisory firm, today released the finding of its latest study on SMB landscape of Australia. The report revealed that Australian SMBs contribute 40% to the GDP and generate 70 per cent of employment in Australia. The study also highlights key business & IT trends of the SMB market

Advertisment

As per the study, a total of 2.1 million SMBs operating in Australia are realizing collective revenue of $530 billion. The report also suggests that the Australian SMB market is fragmented across verticals; retail, professional services and construction contribute to 40 per cent of SMB revenue & employment while health care and real estate services are emerging rapidly in Australia.

Commenting upon the IT opportunities for SMBs in Australia, Praveen Bhadada, director market expansion Zinnov said, "Access to the best in class technology infrastructure and huge addressable opportunity for ICT Adoption by Australian SMBs have made the market a lucrative destination for emerging businesses. Today 92 pc of Australian SMBs have internet with broadband and $24 billion is the Total Addressable IT opportunity for SMBs. Investments in Mobility, Security, and SaaS are driving Software & Services growth in Australia"

The study insights are suggestive of the fact that the utilization of information technology is strongly contributing to the growth of Australian SMBs with approximately 1.9 million SMBs having accessibility to Internet and PC ownership. Smartphone penetration is as high as 67 pc among SMBs while 30% of SMBs are already accessing tablet devices.

Advertisment

The report also highlights Cloud Computing emerging as a core focus area for SMB IT Investments. SMBs in Eastern Australia - New South Wales, Victoria, and Queensland have shown maximum cloud usage and 32 pc of total SMBs in Australia are expected to move completely on cloud by end of 2013. The SaaS market in Australian SMBs stood at $255 million while the IaaS is valued at $285 million in 2012.

With cloud computing growing strongly, non-technical business influencers are starting to play a vital role in SMB IT purchase in Australia. The report estimates that more than half of the IT decisions on behalf of SMBs are made by these non-technical professionals.

While the contribution of IT is increasing at a promising growth rate, immense SMB export potential still remains untapped. This is prevalent due to certain challenges resulting in the Australian SMBs market to undergo a steep mortality rate; the prime issues being inconsistent cash flow, non-supportive government policies & employment issues, and shortage of skilled labor among other factors.

smb-news