A successful application

Gartner's Ken McGee and other analysts have concluded that the looming threat of recession may force some CIOs to cut their IT budgets for 2008 (CIOs must prepare for economic uncertainty).

But considering the correlation between innovation, growth initiatives and the technology that fosters them, this option could prove unfeasible for many organisations.

The conundrum is how to grow the business and the corresponding infrastructure in the face of stagnant or declining IT budgets.

Eliminating outdated or underused IT assets may offer immediate cost relief, but how do businesses support growth?

Obviously, the ideal is to be able to do more with existing resources, and this is where application virtualisation is tipped as the next big thing for IT infrastructure in 2008.

By providing the tools to create a flexible, on-demand infrastructure that intelligently provisions processing power as and when required across the entire organisation, application virtualisation enables CIOs to do more with less.

Return on investment is quick and easily supported, and as markets tighten and competition grows, this is one of the few technologies that can improve customer service levels and internal service level agreements.

Rather than inducing mass eliminations, the predicted IT budget squeeze could be an opportunity for the savvy CIO to capitalise on up-and-coming technologies, and harness resources rather than cut them.

Alun Baker