The market for information technology and telecommunications (ICT) products and services in the European Union will grow stably in 2019, but at a slower rate than in the previous year.
ICT sales in the EU countries are expected to increase by 2.4 percent this year to 653 billion euros. Last year, the increase was slightly higher at 2.9 percent.
This was announced by the digital association Bitkom on the basis of a recent study by the European Information Technology Observatory (EITO). As in previous years, the IT business is outperforming the telecommunications market.
According to the forecast, sales of IT hardware, IT services and software will rise by 3.0 percent to 357 billion euros, with Ireland (up 6.6 percent), Finland (up 4.1 percent) and Sweden (up 4.0) recording the strongest growth rates among the Northern and Western European countries.
In the eastern EU countries, the Czech Republic (plus 6.6 percent), Bulgaria (plus 6.5 percent) and Croatia (plus 5.2 percent) are leading the way. By contrast, the telecommunications market in the EU is growing more weakly - by 1.7 percent to 296 billion euros.
According to the EITO forecast, global ICT sales will increase by 2.8 percent to 3.2 trillion euros. The market for information technology will grow globally by 4.1 percent to EUR 1.5 trillion, while growth in telecommunications will be 1.7 percent to EUR 1.7 trillion.
In an international comparison, the ICT markets in India (plus 8.7 percent), Brazil (plus 6.8 percent), Russia (plus 6.0 percent) and Turkey (plus 5.1 percent) are growing particularly strongly.
