The total market for software products in the EU amounted to € 63 billion in 2004, increasing 4.1 percent compared to 2003; it was expected to reach a solid growth of 5.4 percent in 2005. This market consists of systems software (€ 33.3 billion in 2004) and application software (€ 30.0 billion). The market for systems software was the largest growing segment, increasing 5.3 percent compared to 2003. The application software, on the other hand, increased 3.3 percent compared to 2003. The recovery in software spending will rely mainly on the acceleration in license upgrades and renewals. Sales in system infrastructure software would particularly be strong, due to continuing demand for security, storage and integration software. The total EU market for software was predicted to reach a value of € 70.9 billion in 2006, increasing 5.9 percent compared to 2005. The market for system software was expected to grow 6.5 percent to € 37.7 billion in 2006. It is slightly outpacing the growth in the market for application software, was expected to increase by 5.3 percent to € 33.2 billion in 2006.

Germany was the largest EU-market for software products in 2004, amounting to € 15.4 billion in 2004. This is an increase of 3.5 percent when compared to the market demand in 2003. It was followed by the United Kingdom (UK), with a total of € 13.5 billion in 2004, increasing five percent compared to 2003. Ranked third was France (€ 11.2 billion in 2004, increase of 4.6 percent), Italy was fourth (€ 4.8 billion in 2004, increase of 2.6 percent) and the Netherlands had the fifth place in 2004 (€ 4.7 billion in 2004, increase of 3.7 percent).