SENIOR-LEVEL IT executives in Singapore and elsewhere in Asia are more willing to pay extra for energy efficient products than their global counterparts.
This finding comes from Symantec's Green IT report, released yesterday. The report notes that there is a significant level of interest in green IT strategies and solutions in Singapore and the Asia-Pacific including Japan (APJ).
The report notes a shift in APJ from implementing 'green' technologies primarily for cost reduction purposes, to a more balanced awareness of the need to improve the organisation's environmental standing.
Symantec's Bernard Kwok told BizIT that there was a keen interest in the region, especially Singapore, in green IT initiatives.
'There is a growing understanding among organisations that green IT is not only about cost savings and energy reductions, but is also about being socially responsible,' Mr Kwok, Symantec's senior VP for the APJ region, said.
He added that the negative impact of carbon emissions is being felt around the world, and businesses that make the effort to shrink their carbon footprint will reap the benefits of an improved corporate reputation in addition to the monetary savings.
Mr Kwok noted that 79 per cent of businesses in APJ see their green IT budgets rising over the next 12 months - higher than the global figure of 73 per cent.
'One possible reason is that businesses are taking a long-term view of their IT investment . . . 93 per cent of APJ companies see IT product efficiency as important or very important and are willing to pay a premium for energy efficient products.'
He noted that 74 per cent of APJ companies would pay at least 10 per cent more for energy efficient products, compared to 68 per cent globally.
In fact, 50 per cent of businesses in APJ would pay at least 20 per cent more, while worldwide, only 41 per cent of businesses would do the same, Mr Kwok said.
'Despite the current economy, Symantec sees an increased interest in technology solutions that will help organisations maximise their existing IT resources and be more energy efficient.'
Symantec surveyed 1,052 companies worldwide for the Green IT report. Out of these, 356 companies - including 25 from Singapore - were from the APJ region.
'The companies surveyed ranged in size from 1,000-50,000 or more employees. The APJ respondents were all top officials or directors who either work for an IT department or work in a department that oversees IT,' Mr Kwok said.
He noted that green IT isn't only applicable to data centres even though 21-25 per cent of a company's IT budget is typically spent on electricity for the data centre. The typical respondent reported spending US$21-27 million on data centre electricity.
One other area that companies can explore applying green IT is PCs, Mr Kwok said. 'In a year, 76 per cent of APJ businesses spend at least US$100 on a PC that is left on overnight . . . 41 per cent actually spend at least US$250 a year per PC.' He added that with 68 per cent of APJ organisations having at least 1,000 PCs left on overnight, 'that's a sizable amount of unnecessary money being spent'.
To counter this, businesses could centrally manage desktop power settings to reduce energy costs and carbon emissions. They could also create power management policies to educate employees on the need to reduce this unnecessary spend, the Symantec official said.
Mr Kwok noted that the world is moving towards building a greener, more sustainable environment. 'In the past couple of years we've seen businesses take giant strides in that direction. Technology vendors have had a hand in this as they develop solutions that enable businesses to do more with less, to maximise capacity and reduce their power consumption.'
He noted that cost reduction will always be a factor, especially in such economic times, however, the survey clearly showed that businesses are increasingly placing a higher priority on being green, irrespective of commercial considerations.
'For example, 85 per cent of APJ businesses have a green advocate who is in charge of coordinating all green activities, most of which have an IT focus.'
The Symantec official noted that the main drivers of green IT as shown by the report were:
Reduce electricity consumption (92 per cent);
Reduce cooling costs (90 per cent);
Reduce use of polluting energy (87 per cent);
Space saving (86 per cent);
'Corporate wants us to be 'green' (85 per cent).
IT professionals are regularly deploying several key initiatives for green IT purposes, the report showed. Replacing old equipment was the most popular strategy, with 95 per cent reporting new energy efficient equipment as part of their strategy, followed by monitoring power consumption (94 per cent), server virtualisation (94 per cent), and server consolidation (93 per cent).
Additionally, more than half (57 per cent) of respondents see software-as-a-service offerings as a part of 'green' solutions.
