Microsoft and Amazon remain big winners in CIO spending intentions – Bernstein

Bernstein analysts share key takeaways from his discussions with three CIOs from the Transportation, Media, and Services industries with combined IT budgets of more than $550 million.

The key takeaways are:

1) IT spending expectations for 2023 have softened but remain positive;

2) AI/LLM efforts are nascent;

3) Enthusiasm for the cloud has somewhat plateaued;

4) Microsoft (NASDAQ:) and Amazon (NASDAQ:) remain big winners in CIO spending intentions.

“Consistent with survey respondents, while the CIO panelists still expect their budgets to grow in 2023 compared with 2022, all three CIOs have revised their budgets downwards, despite fairly consistent spending priorities, reflecting tougher business conditions, cost inflation and accompanying scrutiny of all opex,” analysts said in a client note.

When it comes to the traditional IT hardware vendors, like Dell (NYSE:), HP Inc (NYSE:), and Hewlett Packard Enterprise (NYSE:), spending “remains weak,” added analysts.