Retailers are not slashing IT budgets, according to research from Aldata Solution and IBM.

The Global Retail CIO Survey 2009, conducted by Martec International, polled 57 chief information officers and IT directors globally, who account for more than 5 per cent of the North American and EMEA retail markets. Just over half forecast static budgets this year.

An additional 26 per cent believe that budgets will increase, due to major projects that are already under way.

This bullish estimate is put into context by the finding that the bulk of investment will go on technology projects with short return on investment cycles.

Retailers’ shopping lists include automatic replenishment, demand forecasting, promotions optimisation and multichannel customer relationship management applications.

European retailers are spending slightly more of their budgets on IT than their North American counterparts, at 1.1 per cent to 0.9 per cent respectively. However, the study notes that there is no correlation between satisfaction with systems and the level of IT spend.