Security spending to hit $13.6bn by 2006

Global spending on enterprise security products will rise to $13.5bn in 2006, spurred on by the need for security administrators to manage an increasing number of new threats, according to research published by analyst firm Datamonitor.

Increased interest in security solutions among enterprises around the world has ensured that security product revenues have exceeded those of many other IT solutions, Datamonitor said as it released the latest figures.

In its report, Datamonitor says growing awareness of the need to offer IT systems greater protection, together with new legislation, saw enterprises spend $7.1bn on security products in 2002.

Companies are spending the most money on intrusion protection, vulnerability assessment solutions and security management tools, due largely to a number of high-profile virus outbreaks, and perimeter protection solutions are remaining popular by peddling terms such as "layered security". The layered-security approach encourages enterprises to embed more technologies at each layer of the enterprise: at the perimeter, within the network, on servers and on client devices such as PCs and PDAs.

North America is predicted to remain the largest market, with sales tipped to reach $6.9bn in 2006. Latin America followed by the Asia-Pacific region will grow the fastest, with compound annual growth rates from 2002 to 2006 of 25 percent and 23 percent respectively.

Europe, the Middle East and Africa (EMEA) will grow at 18 percent a year.

Despite this increasing demand for security products, vendors with more than one solution in their portfolio have often performed well in one market but have mostly failed to increase sales of their other products, said Datamonitor. Ian Williams, programme manager for Datamonitor's enterprise security team, said that despite the growing market some vendors are struggling in the face of stiff competition.