New Delhi, Feb 12 (IANS): The tech spending in India is likely to grow 8.7 per cent in 2022, one of the highest growth rates in the Asia Pacific region, according to a new report.

Although the second wave of Covid-19 dampened the pace of Indiaa¿s recovery in early 2021, economic activity picked up in the second half of the year thanks to a sharp drop in case numbers and progress made on vaccination.

"That said, energy shortages, rising inflation concerns, and a possible resurgence of Covid-19 could make its recovery a bumpy one," said the Forrester report.

After cutting hardware spending in 2020, Indian tech leaders will spend 7 per cent more on it in 2021.

Communication equipment also saw strong 6.9 per cent growth as telcos expanded their investment in and trials of 5G.

"Software was the only spending category that did not take a significant blow during the 2020 contraction, and we expected its growth to jump to nearly 15 per cent in 2021," the report showed.

Following 2021's spending spree, growth in hardware and communication equipment will dip from 6 per cent or 7 per cent in 2021 to 4 per cent or 5 per cent in 2022.

"We expect demand to be high in infrastructure modernisation, business process automation, and tech strategy consulting services. We also expect Indian firms to seek the help of third-party IT service providers to set up agile development, DevOps, or continuous integration and delivery capabilities," the report noted.