Similar to last year's findings, firms which anticipate increases in their budgets will invest in projects that will efficiently run their operations to boost productivity and improve competitiveness. These companies have also implemented cost-reduction measures in the past, making use of the available resources and equipment in their day-to-day operations. However, this cannot be done in the long-term as equipment depreciate and need to be replaced with new acquisitions to accommodate company expansions and other requirements.

'Currently we are pushing a business-related requirement for the company and this involves the firm's network and communications system,' disclosed the IT manager of an insurance entity who revealed that their IT resources need to be beefed up this year to more effectively run their business. 'Most of our desktop PCs and network servers were acquired three years ago and cannot anymore support expansions that the company is going to implement. One of our ongoing projects is the insurance administration system and we have other requirements to do. This is the reason why we are increasing our IT budget,' said the IT manager who requested anonymity.

Most of the respondents who said they will have budget hikes this year will implement lower rates of increase. Thirty-seven percent plan to have a budget increase ranging from 10 percent to 30 percent, while 14 percent reported hikes lower than 10 percent. Those who will bring about an increase of more than 30 percent in their budgets comprised 10 percent of the respondents.