CIOs, CTOs and IT managers are increasingly being called on to look into their crystal balls to predict the future, and then translate the options into language management can understand.

PricewaterhouseCoopers (PwC) has released its annual Technology Forecast report, which found that one of the challenges facing Australian companies over the next two years would be evaluating potential new software components and business applications.

Terry Retter, director of strategic technology services at PwC in California, said CIOs would have to make some hard decisions about how they're going to manage transitioning from their current suite of solutions to next generation architecture, such as network services.

Among the findings of the survey was that there is a global trend towards increasing use of open source software as an alternative to commercially-licensed products.

The forecast also found a mixed outlook for Web services, anticipating that the vision of a seamless connection wouldn't materialise within the next two years. Instead, PwC envisages Web services as more likely to be used for integration between trusted business partners during this timeframe.

Retter said that Australian businesses were ahead in some areas, and behind in others. He believes we're ahead in technologies such as mobile and wireless, particularly in the financial services industries.

But he warns that Australian CIOs need to be much more understanding of the business drivers within their organisations, and also the impact of change on the business' customer's customer. This includes learning about new technologies and translating this into language the business managers could understand.

Retter admitted, -If you think about what they have to learn," it's not an easy task for these IT managers. -By the time you get through all the existing things you have to get working there's not a lot of time left in the day."

It's an opinion mirrored by Martyn Mitchell, PwC's Asia-Pacific lead partner for technology, information communications and entertainment. Mitchell said that although potentially Australian companies will be able to use the new technologies cited in the report, significant risks also came with these developments.

-Concerted effort will be required by senior executives to ensure opportunities are strategically evaluated and the transition and implementation process are carefully managed," Mitchell said. -Otherwise companies will run the risk of paying a high price for adopting some of the this advanced software too quickly."

Mitchell also said that the technology value management was now an issue for board-level, as well as CIOs and CFOs, because of its critical success factor.

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