During the global economic crisis in 2008 and 2009, the financial industry had all kinds of problems as we are all aware which not surprisingly  impacted IT spending. Since then they seem to be doing just fine. But other problems have lingered. One of those challenging segments is the construction industry which has taken a lot longer to recover. In addition, particularly in the US, retail drives so much of the economy and that industry suffered as well.

Fast forward to 2012 as the economy has been on the mend and we look back at the progress over the past few years and see 2 industries that have seen solid growth in IT spending along with growing revenue.

Among the Global 5000 companies, there are 210 companies in the Construction industry and 340 companies in Retail.

Over the past few years, the Construction companies saw year over year changes as follows:

  • 2008 grew at 12.3%
  • 2009 was negative – 7.6%
  • 2010 grew again at 6%
  • 2011 surged ahead 12.2%

Revenue for Retail companies did not fall as much and did not bounce back as high either.

  • 2008 growth was 6.9%
  • 2009 was negative – 2.6%
  • 2010 grew again at 5.6%
  • 2011 showed growth at 7.7%

Looking at IT spending in those industries, the Construction companies in the Global 5000 spend approximately $11 billion annually while those in the Retail industry spend over $62 billion per year … both substantial sums.

In both cases, the IT spend in these two sectors grew more than 9% from 2010 to 2011 and for those providers in the right spot to watch these comebacks, the rewards can be attractive.