Study: IT outsourcing often disappoints

Computer Sciences, Hewlett-Packard, IBM and iStructure lead the pack when it comes to information technology outsourcing that improves a client's IT infrastructure, according to a new report from Forrester Research. The market research firm concluded that IT outsourcing lowers costs, but often fails to enhance IT infrastructure. IT outsourcing refers to one company farming out of IT-related tasks, such as managing desktop computers or developing applications.

Computer Sciences, HP and IBM were top performers for both desktop computer environments and distributed computing environments. Forrester said iStructure, a Level 3 Communications company, joined the leaders category in the area of distributed computing. IT outsourcing has been seen as a hopeful field in the bleak overall IT spending landscape. Forrester says IT outsourcing is the fastest-growing segment of the technology services market--expanding at a 14 percent annual rate through 2007.