March 31 news, according to foreign media reports, according to market research firm Gartner said, driven by the demand for iPad and other media tablet PCs, global IT spending in 2011 is expected to increase by 5.6% to 5.6 trillion US dollars.

Gartner’s latest predictions indicate that sales of global media tablet PCs in 2011 are expected to increase from US$9.6 billion in 2010 to US$29.4 billion. The average annual growth rate of global media tablet sales from now to 2015 is expected to reach 52%.

Richard Gordon, Gartner’s vice president of research, said that according to the constant dollar exchange rate, if there is no media tablet, this forecast will decrease slightly. However, with media tablets, there is virtually no change in the overall forecast level of IT.

Gartner expects that in 2011, computer hardware spending will increase by 9.5%, enterprise software spending will increase by 7.6%, and IT service spending will increase by 5%.