One in 10 IT departments will be scrapped by 2011

One in 10 IT departments will disappear over the next five years as outsourcing and the commoditisation of technology continues to increase, according to Gartner.

The analyst predicts a period of radical change for IT departments, which will either have to take on a wider business transformation remit or face being completely embedded into the organisation as a pervasive commodity that is managed by business - as opposed to IT - executives as part of their functional roles.

This will see at least three-quarters of IT departments change their role with 10 per cent completely disbanded and 10 per cent relegated to commodity status.

Outsourcing will also have a greater impact over the next five years with IT departments employing 20 per cent fewer people and cutting the number of in-house technology roles by 40 per cent. By contrast businesses will double the number of information, process and business roles compared to 2005, according to Gartner's predictions.

John Mahoney, chief of research for IT services and management at Gartner, said a new type of IT department is emerging and that the role of IT leader will evolve with it.

He said in a statement: "While it will grow from an IT base, the primary focus of the new organisation will be business transformation and strategic assets of information and process. When mature, it may no longer be identified as an IT organisation."

But Mahoney said there is still controversy within businesses about the extent to which IT can, should or will be trusted with leadership of business processes and information.