For everyone involved in IT recruitment, the burst of activity seen in July was a welcome relief, as vacancies ended up hitting levels not seen since Q1. Indeed, the final total for the month, was the third highest since April 2023. Nonetheless, the pragmatists will recognize that the general election being announced in May, resulted in many businesses deferring investment decisions, including hiring, until after the result, which had meant that Q2 was materially quieter than Q1. So the burst in July could just be the result of that pent up demand being recognized.
Analysis shows that SAP vacancies are projected to decrease by 34.1% in 2024 compared to 2023 (comparatively, in the 2022 to 2023 data analysis, vacancies decreased by 2.1%). Similarly, regional SAP vacancies are on track for two consecutive years of decline. This trend decline in SAP hiring reflects the broader slowdown impacting the technology sector as it adapts to the transition to a more rigid financial discipline.
The deceleration of tech-centric sectors in London during 2023 mirrors the broader downturn experienced across the UK, with IT vacancies plummeting by 50.5% in the capital compared to 36.3% regionally. Hence the fact that demand for IT professionals has fallen 42.8% compared to the peaks seen in 2022, is a temporary blip.
First ARM relists to the NASDAQ and sees their share price double since their IPO. Now more companies are being targeted as the UK struggles to compete in a new world order, where it is no longer able to operate as the financial services capital of the EU.
As Europe’s most advanced e-commerce market, the UK has approximately 60 million e-commerce users. With that, shopping online has become the norm, which has had implications for retailers on the high street, especially outside of main shopping hubs, where the pandemic period had resulted in a significant surge in activity. Now, post-pandemic, there has been a slowdown as the market has normalized, which has meant that when looking at e-commerce, there has been a drop of 42.5% in IT vacancies compared to 2022, according to the latest UK Tech Report by Talent Alpha and Vacancysoft.
