Survey results on best value from ICT investment
A survey by 3i, shows that more than half of private companies across Europe spent at least 0.5% of turnover last year on Information and Communication Technologies (ICT) and almost one in seven companies in Europe invested more than 5% of turnover in ICT.
Spending on ICT was highest in Germany and Italy.
Investment in web sites has continued to rise.
Just 44% of private companies in France and 63% in the UK had a web site in 1999, compared with close to 90% in both countries today.
More than half of the companies participating in the latest survey said that investment in ICT yielded the most value in the area of administration and management.
Internal and external communications were also rated highly out of a total of seven different categories. Finance occupied last place, behind logistics and product innovation respectively.
There were several variations in the survey results from UK respondents to questions about the value derived from ICT, compared with those of their counterparts elsewhere in Europe.
Whilst administration, management and communications came out top overall, a greater number of UK companies have gained more value from external and internal communications than companies in other European countries.
In addition, UK companies placed finance before product or process innovation.
