Security to remain IT market's golden goose

Sales of security wares to expand by seven per cent until 2017 as market remains insulated from IT budget cuts

IT security spending will remain largely immune from IT budget cuts over the coming years, according to Canalys.

The analyst house reckons spending on IT security wares will grow at a compound annual rate of 6.6 per cent until 2017, when the market will be worth $30.1bn (£19.5bn).

After posting muted growth of three per cent last year, the EMEA IT security market will bounce back this year as local businesses gear up for impending changes to the EU data protection directive, Canalys said.

This will propel the EMEA market to eight per cent growth for 2013. In comparison, Gartner predicts the overall EMEA IT market will inch up just 1.4 per cent this year.

Medium-sized businesses will be the biggest growth segment over the next five years as they plough more of their IT budget into complying with data protection regulations and giving customers reassurance about the services they provide, Canalys added.

The global market for mid-sized firms with 100 to 499 employees will grow by 7.3 per cent annually to $8.5bn between 2012 and 2017, the analyst predicted. Within that, network security will grow by 7.7 per annually to $3.36bn, content security by 6.7 per cent to $3.26bn and security management – which includes identity and access management and security information and event management – will swell by 7.6 per cent to $1.88bn.

Canalys expects the micro-business and small business segments to expand by 4.5 and 5.9 per cent annually over the same period, respectively. The large business and service provider segments are set to swell by 6.5 and 6.7 per cent, meanwhile.

BYOD and the shift to virtual and cloud evironments will also force business to rethink their security posture, fuelling product refresh cycles.

"Corporate data in today's world resides in a fragmented ecosystem of on-premises, virtual and cloud environments. This shift will continue to drive security and infrastructure management investment over the next few years,' said Canalys analyst Nushin Vaiani.

Worth $1.3bn last year, the UK security market will enjoy a compound annual growth rate of 6.8 per cent until 2017, when it will stand $1.87bn.