Spending on information technology (IT) in Australia is expected to grow just 2.3 percent in 2018 to reach $84.5 billion, according to new figures from market research company Gartner. A further rise to $86.9 billion is tipped for the 2019 calendar year.

The Gartner report estimates spending of $12.19 billion on devices, $12.57 billion on software, $30.34  billion on IT services, $26.6 billion on communications services and $2.7 billion on data centres.

All categories except datacentres show a rise in spending from 2017 . The 2018 datacentre total of $2.7 billion compares with $2.75 billion in the previous year – but this is tipped to rise back up to $2.75 billion in 2019.

The Australian figures are contained in Gartner’s latest quarterly forecast for global technology spending, published this week.  It predicts worldwide spending in 2018 will be up 6.2 percent at US$3.7 trillion. Gartner says this is the highest annual growth rate it has forecast since 2007.

However, it says, it’s a matter of the declining US dollar causing “currency tailwinds” of 3.2pc.  “Spending on IT around the world is growing at expected levels, and 3.0pc is in line with the expected global economic growth of 3.3pc in 2018,” Gartner says.

But some sectors are doing better than others. Gartner notes that enterprise software spending is forecast to experience the highest growth rate this year at 11.1 percent.