Harnessing Artificial Intelligence to Fuel the Bright Future of Dutch IT Services
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A bright future ahead for Dutch IT services
Demand for cybersecurity services is on the rise – and with it the growth of the Dutch IT service sector. Labour shortages and rising wages are proving a major challenge, but businesses appear to remain optimistic. Could artificial intelligence offer a magic fix?
A promising outlook
The Dutch IT services sector is expected to grow by 4.5% in 2023 and 2.5% in 2024. Despite a slightly lower growth rate than in both 2021 and 2022 (during which the Covid-19 pandemic led to the rapid adoption of digital products and services) the sector still shows strong growth compared to GDP. Growth is largely driven by the continued demand for cybersecurity services, as well as the need for automation and the outsourcing of IT services and infrastructure such as off-premise data centres.
According to research firms such as IDC and Gartner, Western European companies are planning to increase their spending on IT services by 5% to 8%, and Canalys expects spending on cloud infrastructure to increase by 19% in 2023. Dutch IT service providers benefit from these trends, as the Netherlands plays a crucial role in the European cloud infrastructure.
However, the sector isn't growing without restrictions – namely, the slower pace of the Dutch economy, persisting labour shortages and rising wages. There was even a moment when the Dutch IT sector appeared to shrink in the first quarter of 2023 due to declining demand for IT equipment. After revisions by CBS, however, it has become evident that the sector is at least experiencing modest growth. In short, we expect it to continue growing through the remainder of this year and into 2024.
Continued growth for IT services
