Political uncertainty and rising costs are biggest threats to IT industry

Political uncertainty and the challenges posed by rising costs are considered the biggest threats to the IT industry.

This was revealed within the results of Uninterruptible Power Supplies Limited’s (UPSL) latest industry survey, which questioned more than 800 senior IT and data centre professionals across the UK and Ireland.

The 2018 edition of the poll revealed that over 35% believe political uncertainty is the biggest threat to their business over the coming 12 months.



This was closely followed by rising costs (including energy costs), which received almost 32% of the vote. Increasing regulatory burden garnered nearly 13% for third place, with increased competition from new and existing competitors completing the top five responses.

UPSL  sales and marketing director, Tim Wilkes, commented on the results: “We conduct the survey every two years and it is always interesting to see the impact time has on the responses.

“When comparing the latest results to those from 2016, it is clear there’s been a significant shift in attitudes. Political uncertainty didn’t register as a top ten response back then but that was before the Brexit vote and the impact that it’s had on the value of the pound.

“That rising costs is a close second is less surprising. In 2016, rising energy costs was the top response for over 77% of respondents, so it says a lot about how the UK’s IT and data centre business landscape has shifted in just two years.”

It could be argued that the latest results reflect the perceived lack of clarity over Brexit, combined with the threat of increased US protectionism and a range of other global geopolitical factors facing the industry right now.

Those concerns were supported by another question from the survey, which posed: “What impact do you think Brexit will have on your business?”.

More than 60% of those questioned felt that Brexit will have a negative impact on their business, with 50.75% fearing it will have ‘a small negative impact’ and 13.40% who worried it would have ‘a large negative impact’. Conversely, just 15.10% of those questioned felt that Brexit would have a positive impact on their business.