Qatar Information Technology Report Q3 20007

Market Overview

With Qatar's economy set to remain on an elevated growth track, and tenders for new fixed and mobile telecoms licences in 2007, the economic environment should provide strong support for IT spending going forward. Qatar's total IT market is expected to reach a value of US$273mn in 2007 and US$398mn by 2010. Led by dynamic ICT governing body ictQATAR, recently reinforced with a new government

'Sponsor Group', e-government projects continue to be rolled out. There are also programmes in areas such as education. High oil prices continue to underpin general economic buoyancy, while a growing economic diversification epitomised by buoyant construction and real estate industries. With Qatar now one of the richest countries in the world in per capita terms, BMI is confident that the IT sector should continue to grow particularly strongly, with software and services (41% of total spending) advancing at the expense of hardware (59%).

At the forefront of this growth will be the IT Services market, which as demonstrated by the recent contract won by EDS is becoming a source of great opportunity for vendors. The IT Services segment is expected to surpass a value of US$100mn within the forecast period, as major technology-using sectors such as financial services, communications, and oil invest to meet strategic objectives. The software market is also growing fast, with a new focus on applications from the SMB sector while larger companies still offer potential. Vendors are reviewing and expanding channel structures to take advantage, with a recent example being Microsoft's decision to expand its contract with Mindshare to cover Qatar and the Northern Gulf states. Overall IT market CAGR is expected to be around 9%, with high oil prices encouraging more large scale IT investments and infrastructure developments. Meanwhile the measures to introduce telecoms liberalisation should provide a renewed boost to ICT development.