Bitkom expects strong growth in employees and revenues for 2019. However, the ICT industry association anticipates a drop in revenue in one sector.
The IT, telecommunications, and consumer electronics market is expected to grow by 1.5 percent to €168.5 billion this year. Bitkom expects 1,174,000 people to be employed in the sector by the end of the year. This represents an increase of 40,000 jobs and a 3.5 percent increase compared to 2018.
“Digitalization is driving the market and is a guarantee for more jobs,”
says Bitkom-President Achim Berg.
"Software companies and IT service providers are doing particularly well. These sectors are creating by far the most jobs."
Last year, revenues increased by 2.0 percent, compared to the association's forecast of 1.7 percent growth. According to current Bitkom calculations, the ICT industry created 36,000 additional jobs in 2018.
Biggest growth in software
Information technology remains the industry's most important growth driver and is expanding its importance. Revenues are expected to increase by 2.5 percent to €92.2 billion this year. Bitkom expects the software segment to see the largest increase, with 6.3 percent to €26.0 billion.
In contrast, the hardware business is experiencing a slight decline, with a decline of 0.7 percent to €25.4 billion. The association predicts particularly sharp declines in sales of desktop PCs (minus 8.4 percent), servers (minus 7.0 percent), and multifunction printers (minus 3.8 percent).
The telecommunications market is expected to grow by 1.1 percent to €67.3 billion. Consumer electronics is developing quite differently, posting losses for the second consecutive year. The smallest ICT submarket by far is expected to shrink by 5.0 percent to €9.0 billion in 2019. Achim Berg says:
"The consumer electronics market is shrinking because sales are declining. While average prices per device are rising in many categories, such as televisions, this cannot compensate for the decline in sales."
Skilled labor shortage could slow down digitalization
Over the past five years, more than 150,000 jobs have been created in the ICT sector, according to Berg. However, the job situation could look better if there were sufficient skilled workers. The Bitkom president expects this problem to continue to worsen. According to a recent study by the association, 82,000 positions for IT experts were unfilled at the end of 2018. This represents an increase of 49 percent compared to 2017. The association therefore calls for the digitization of schools, incentives for digital training, and easier immigration of foreign IT specialists.
