2011 starts with a glow of optimism supported by a consensus that growth in the IT and software service sector will return even if investment growth has not yet shown a clear and strong trend. After a torrid 2009 in the IT sector, EITO forecast at the beginning of 2010 a small restart of IT spending in Europe estimated at 0.6% and a growth of 1.1% for the software and IT services market. At the end of 2010, Syntec finally confirmed a growth of 1% for the software, consultancy and IT services sector in France in 2010 and announced a growth forecast of 3% for 2011.

After recruiting 35000 people in 2010 for a total net increase in employment of 3000 to 5000 people, the sector breathes more freely and 2011 starts under much better conditions than the previous year. ESG, a strategy consulting and IT analytical company has announced in February 2011 in its survey « IT Spending Intentions 2011 » that IT spending continues to stabilise and that more than 51% of people interviewed indicate that IT budgets in 2011 will be higher than in 2010.

 Financial reporting by the major players indicate a strong rebound at the end of 2010 (certainly overstated given a difficult previous year comparable period) and very favourable forecasts for 2011 : Accenture + 8% to +11%, Alten at least +8%, SAP +10% to 14%.

Over the past 15 years, we have seen that periods of strong M&A activities often coincided with periods of strong market growth, the reverse being also totally true.

This is therefore a very favourable period which is starting now and the most agile investors will no doubt exploit it to their advantage.