Over 40 percent of IT professionals forecast the mobile platform will emerge as the focus of most software builds in 2011, according to a new survey released by IBM. The 2010 IBM Tech Trends Survey--conducted online by the IBM developerWorks professional network in 
August and September, and spanning a range of IT segments--finds that 40.5 percent of respondents believe mobile efforts will dominate development initiatives in the year ahead, while 33.1 percent of respondents expect high demand for cloud computing/SaaS projects. Social media (26.5 percent) barely edges out business analytics (26.0 percent), trailed by industry-specific software projects (24.0 percent). Asked whether they believe mobile application development will surpass efforts on other platforms over the next five years, 55.0 percent of respondents said "Yes"--26.7 percent said "No," and the remaining 18.3 percent answered "I don't know."
IT professionals participating in the IBM survey also are high on the long-range potential of cloud computing. Asked to rate the cloud's potential to overtake on-premise computing as the primary method that organizations acquire IT by 2015, 30.4 percent believe such a scenario is "Likely," 21.6 percent say it is "Most Likely" and 13.6 percent believe it "Definitely" will happen--while 25.6 percent of respondents are more cautious, anticipating it is "Somewhat likely," the remaining 8.8 percent maintain it is "Not at all likely."
Other findings of the 2010 IBM Tech Trends Survey:
- Ninety percent of respondents believe it is important to possess vertical industry-specific skills for their jobs--however, 63 percent confess they lack the industry knowledge necessary to remain competitive.
- Telecommunications, financial services, healthcare and energy and utilities rank as the top four verticals identified by respondents as offering the greatest opportunity to expand their careers.
For more on the 2010 IBM Tech Trends Survey:
- read this release