Service Providers of the Information Society – Extensive Use of Specifically Designed Business Software

In the economic sector of IT-related service providers, more than two thirds of the companies use software that has been created according to their specific requirements. Approximately 75 per cent of the companies make use of sector-specific software and more than 90 per cent of standard software.

Moreover, a large part of the companies has the applied software customised or further developed by their employees or external providers. This is the result of an economic survey among service providers of the information society conducted by the Centre for European Economic Research, Mannheim, in cooperation with Creditreform, Neuss, in June 2007.

Architects, technical consultants and planners as well as companies in the advertising industry use specifically designed software comparatively rarely. Nearly half of the architects and the companies in this branch and slightly more than half of the technical planners and consultants confirm the application of firm-specific software. However, telecommunications providers as well as research and development companies frequently use specifically created business software (more than 80 per cent of companies in these industry sectors).

The application of sector-specific software in ICT-specialised trade firms and software and IT service companies is rather rare. Approximately half of the ICT-specialised traders and about two thirds of the companies of the software and IT service industry use sector-specific software.

More than 80 per cent of the IT-related service providers state that their applied business software has been modified or further developed. Architects as well as technical planners and consultants turn to external providers for customisation and further development of the applied software. Just about half of the architects and slightly more than two thirds of the technical planners and consultants indicate that their software has been modified or further developed by their employees. This, on the other hand, seems to be common practice among business consultants and companies of the software and IT service industry; more than 80 per cent of the software and IT service companies and about 75 per cent of the business consultants rather have their employees modify and further develop business software instead of relying on external providers.

The economic survey conducted by the ZEW/Creditreform

About 800 businesses participate in the quarterly survey. The economic sector service providers of the information society consists of information and communication technology (ICT) service providers (businesses of the branches software and IT services, ICT-specialised trade and telecommunication services) and knowledge intensive service providers (businesses of the sub-sectors tax consultancy and accounting, business consultancy, architectural offices, technical consultancy and planning, research and development and advertising).

Comment on the projection

To ensure the analyses’ representativity, the ZEW projects the answers of the survey participants with the turnover value of the businesses with regard to the entire economic sector service providers of the information society. The phrasing "share of the businesses" therewith reflects the share of turnovers of the businesses.

Contact

Dr. Jenny Meyer, E-mail: meyer@zew.de