Deakin Uni faces massive IT cut

Beverley Head
Tuesday, 20 December 2011 14:34

Business IT - Technology

Deakin University is staring down the barrel of 'pretty drastic cuts' to its IT budget in 2012 as the institution reacts to an increasingly uncertain economic landscape.

Peter Brusco, Deakin's director of IT services, said that the university was trimming costs right across the board but that; 'IT has been cut more than any other area in percentage terms.

'It's not really surprising, but the quantum is a bit of a surprise.' He said he was expecting a cut of between 10 and 20 per cent which would affect both his capital and operational budgets.

Gartner warned recently that education sector organisations in Australia would increase their spending on ICT by less than 1 per cent in 2012, taking the total to $1.8 billion. That represents a decrease in real terms given the current rate of inflation.

Mr Brusco said that he believed it was the sense of uncertainty about the future that has Deakin's administrators reining in spending rather than any fundamental financial problems at the university. 'This is more about being cautious he said.'

'My impression is that it's a similar story in other universities,' he added. According to the Council of Australian University Directors of IT (Caudit) resourcing and IT budgets were the third most challenging issue university CIOs expected to face this year.

Although he has had to scale back his plans and will be cutting back on the number of IT contractors he uses, Mr Brusco said that Deakin is still planning to go ahead with plans to piggyback its wireless network on top of a CBD wireless network being rolled out in Geelong's CBD, so that students and staff can access Deakin systems from Geelong.

Mr Brusco said this demanded only a minor investment by the university, but delivered significant benefits for staff and students, and that a similar exercise is planned for Warrnambool.