Technology-enabled access to government services and digital archiving has led to a slew of new file types that has created a document storm in Central European governments. According to a recent IDC survey of government bodies in the V4 (Czech Republic, Hungary, Poland, and Slovakia), this helps explain that the primary driver of IT spending in the sector is records and document management, closely followed by provisioning of access to online services. While adoption plans for additional technologies vary, they also include unified communications, identity and access management, and business intelligence/analytics technologies.

"Make no mistake, budgets are still tight and cost and security still top the list of priorities," says Mark Yates, Government Insights senior analyst, IDC CEMA. "But the move towards electronic service provisioning and the archiving of old paper documents has meant virtual paperwork has really piled up and is reaching critical levels. This is already creating the concomitant challenge of connecting document management to backend systems that can also ensure easy access for both civil servants and citizens."

The survey reveals what applications and systems are already in place, as well as what comes next. Additional findings include:

• Security: Nearly all government agencies already have firewall and Web filtering/anti-spam protection. Nearly 40% are planning to implement incident management software in the next 12 months.
• Virtualization: Two-thirds of government entities use virtualized servers as the default for new application deployment. More than half of physical servers are virtualized.
• Cloud: Still in its early stages, with only around half of government IT decision makers using or planning to use cloud services.

The study also makes known which types of security solutions are most in demand, the primary workloads run on virtualized servers, the reasons for and against implementing cloud, applications already running in a cloud environment, and the applications most likely to be moved into the cloud.

About the research

IDC's Business Strategy: Central Europe Government IT Priorities: IDC Government Insights Survey, 2012 (IDC #CEMA18750) is based on a recent dedicated survey intended to improve the understanding of IT decision maker priorities in the governments of the V4 Central European countries. It provides insights into IT priorities, concerns, and drivers, and sheds light on security, virtualization, and cloud computing in government organizations.