IT contractors will find the ever-expanding scale of firms' computer networks is making them increasingly difficult to manage.

This is the view of Paul Phillips, the regional sales director for the UK and Ireland at networking solutions company Brocade.

Mr Phillips adds that it is crucial to maintain a state of awareness of what is happening in the network, no matter what its size is.

He commented: "It's been said many years ago that networks are getting bigger and bigger, and the management of that is becoming increasingly more difficult.

"So management is a key element. It's about simplifying as much as possible."

Immediate virtualisation of the network is essential if companies are to adequately cope with continual expansion, Mr Phillips concluded.

His comments follow the publication of a report from Brocade, which suggested that IT infrastructures are going to evolve to a highly virtualised, services-on-demand state enabled through the cloud.