IT spending is top board-level priority
Corporate boards are prioritizing IT spending as highly as investments in sales operations, according to research announced Monday by analyst firm Gartner.
IT and sales were tied as the top two priorities among 175 board members, mostly in the U.S. and U.K., polled in March and April for the Gartner-Forbes 2012 Board of Directors Survey. Sixty-four percent said IT spending would rise during their companies' fiscal 2012.
Calling board members' attitudes "forward-looking and proactive," Gartner vice president and distinguished analyst Jorge Lopez added that more than half of the survey respondents said they are preparing for a market recession. "It underlines the fact that the investments they plan to make are essential to growth and even survival," he said in a press statement. Read more...
U.S. losing high-tech jobs, R&D dominance to Asia
U.S. companies are locating more of their research and development operations overseas, and Asian countries are rapidly increasing investments in their own science and technology economies, the National Science Board (NSB) reported this week.
While the U.S. remains the global leader in science and technology R&D, that lead is narrowing, asserts NSB, the policymaking body for the National Science Foundation. In particular, 10 countries in Asia -- China, India, Indonesia, Japan, Malaysia, Philippines, Singapore, South Korea, Taiwan and Thailand -- are closing ranks on U.S. leadership in science and technology.
The U.S. share of global R&D expenditures dropped from 38% to 31% between 1999 and 2009, according to NSB's new report, Science and Engineering Indicators 2012. Meanwhile, global R&D share in the Asia region grew from 24% to 35% during the same time frame. Asia's rapid ascent has been driven largely by China, where R&D growth spiked 28% in 2008-2009, landing it in second place behind the U.S. Read more...