According to the survey results, Gartner said that although HVDs have high priority in large and midsize companies in Australia, few big deployments are expected in the next 12 months. While large enterprises in China and India give HVD a lower priority, they currently offer better opportunities for HVD deployments.

“The market for hosted virtual networks will accelerate rapidly through 2013, reaching 49 million units worldwide,” said Lillian Tay, principal research analyst at Gartner.  “However, HVD vendors, especially in Asia Pacific, need to approach emerging and mature markets with different go-to-market strategies based on a multitude of different local factors.”

Ms. Tay said that among the three markets surveyed, it was not surprising that the priority for HVDs is currently highest in Australia where, among large enterprises, having an HVD strategy is the second priority after software as a service (SaaS). Midsize companies rated an HVD strategy as their first priority, followed by SaaS. In terms of implementation, 28 percent of large enterprises and 33 percent of midsize companies in Australia in the survey say they have already implemented HVDs.

However, while Gartner fully believes that HVDs have an opportunity to move to a larger scale in Australia, companies are currently hindered by restricted budgets, with many organizations postponing or cancelling deployments planned for 2009 due to the economic situation. The economic impact on midsize businesses has been particularly pronounced although Gartner expects more funds to be made available in 2010 in many sectors.

In China, survey respondents from large and midsize companies gave HVD strategies a low priority and also rated HVDs lower in terms of helping to lower costs.  Companies here are only just beginning to explore HVD technology and deployment is small with only six percent of large enterprises surveyed having implemented it and 71 percent of midsize companies having no implementation plans.  Nevertheless, interest in HVDs remains, with 41 percent of large enterprises surveyed having budgeted for HVD implementation in 2009.

Companies in India also gave HVDs a low priority in the survey.  This could be because the uneven maturity of IT infrastructure makes it difficult for further HVD deployments in India, without more-substantial IT infrastructure, which is currently not a priority.  HVD implementation in large enterprises is low in India, with only 16 percent saying they have implemented HVDs.  However, 25 percent of large enterprises said that they had budgets put aside for HVDs compared with 11 percent of midsize businesses.

“Given the relative lack of awareness and priority of HVDs in companies in China and India, we advise HVD vendors to develop pilot-ready packages and target them at large enterprises in these markets for the next two years,” said report co-author Eileen He, research analyst at Gartner in China.  “Also, given the varied IT infrastructure maturity in these countries, it is advisable to target the major cities, where vendors should approach vertical industries that have the most interest in the technology.”

Ms. He said that strategies should differ in the more mature Australian market where vendors should concentrate on moving users beyond the pilot stage and keep IT personnel up to date on product development roadmaps so they can understand and prepare to identify new users who will be best-suited for HVDs as the technology progresses.