Croatia’s IT services market in 2009 decreased 7.2% year on year in U.S. dollar terms, to total nearly $394 million – the first annual drop since IDC began tracking this market. However, the decline was the result of the global economic crisis and IDC predicts that IT spending levels in Croatia will soon recover.

In 2010, spending on IT services in Croatia will decline by a further 0.9% but will return to growth the following year – and achieve a healthy average compound annual growth rate (CAGR) of 8.4% from 2011 to 2014, according to Boris Zitnik, Managing Director, IDC Adriatics.

“Although the IT services market in Croatia was dragged down by the 2009–2010 recession, the slowdown of the economy was concentrated in sectors that traditionally have not been IT intensive,” Zitnik says.

“Meanwhile, heavy IT spenders like telecoms and financial institutions continue to show impressive business results. Most importantly, they will not be able to forestall important IT investments for another year,” adds Zitnik.

In terms of IT services investment in Croatia, the public sector was the biggest spender in 2009, with 22.8% market share, followed by the financial and telecommunications sectors (at 21.2% and 19.8%, respectively), according to IDC’s latest research.

Systems integration accounted for the largest share (14.8%) of IT services revenue in Croatia in 2009, followed by custom application development (14.4%) and application consulting and customization (13.5%).

The top three IT services providers in Croatia in 2009 based on revenue were Siemens SIS ($39.90 million in revenue for 8.2% market share), Combis ($31.08 million for 6.4% share), and King ICT ($30.34 million for 6.3% share). IBM and Apis IT rounded out the top five IT services providers with 5.9% and 5.4% shares, respectively.

The study Croatia IT Services 2010–2014 Forecast and 2009 Vendor Shares (IDC Doc #ES02S) presents the Croatian IT services industry in 2009 and forecasts expenditures on IT services through 2014. The study provides market size information, vendor market shares, and revenues by IT services categories and vertical markets, and includes profiles of the top five IT services providers, including their IT services portfolios, their presence in individual vertical markets, and their largest contracts in 2009.