Peter Sondergaard, Gartner's head of research, talked delegates through a diagram that demonstrated how companies change their spending habits depending on the economic climate.
He said 2010 is about balancing cost, risk and growth but expected spending to recover in the healthcare, utility, government and (specifically in Asia) in telecommunications verticals.
"Although global GDP is forecast to grow by 2.6 percent globally and five percent in Asia, IT spending will only grow by 2.3 percent, which means 50 percent of CIOs will experience and IT budget that grows by zero percent or less", he said.