Led by investments in artificial intelligence, blockchain and the “internet of things,” businesses will spend nearly $3.7 trillion on information technology hardware, software and services in 2018, up 4.5 percent from the year before, according to Gartner Inc.’s latest research report.

Gartner’s report breaks down IT spending into five distinct categories – data center systems, enterprise software, devices, IT services and communications services. That last segment will be the highest-grossing, raking in more than $1.4 trillion according to Gartner’s forecast, though enterprise software spending will see the highest growth at a 9.5 percent clip. Overall, Gartner also expects growth to continue in 2019.

John-David Lovelock, Gartner’s research vice president, said much of the spending growth will be driven by new and emerging technologies such as blockchain, IoT and a “progression from big data to algorithms to machine learning to artificial intelligence.”

The forecast follows what was an uncertain year for IT budgets in 2017, Gartner said. It reckons this uncertainty will carry on throughout 2018, though many enterprises will continue to invest in IT in anticipation of the revenue growth it can help them to achieve.

The emerging technologies Gartner mentions won’t necessarily account for the largest chunk of enterprise’s IT budgets, but spending on them will grow at a fairly rapid pace. Gartner said the fact that these technologies are driving IT budget growth suggests they’re quickly gaining legitimacy as enterprises begin to appreciate the benefits they provide.

For example, AI is expected to generate some $2.9 trillion in “business value” by 2021, Lovelock said. The technology will also recover 6.2 billion hours in worker productivity, he added.

“That business value is attributable to using AI to, for example, drive efficiency gains, create insights that personalize the customer experience, entice engagement and commerce, and aid in expanding revenue-generating opportunities as part of new business models driven by the insights from data,” Lovelock said.

Value from AI will only be obtained through a serious financial investment, Gartner said, but AI has the ability to act as a “force multiplier,” creating new network effects and generating increased revenues for enterprises that invest in it.

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