Security spending for virtualized environments is expected to rise. Several companies are shifting to virtualized server infrastructure to leverage computing resources in their networks, save energy and cost.

Companies are looking at making their IT infrastructure more robust. End user companies are now planning to spend more on security, an Infonetics Research survey revealed. The survey was conducted among end-user companies that have deployed server virtualization about their buying plans for security.

Respondent companies expect to spend an average of 51 percent more on security for virtualized environments in 2012 than they did in 2010.

The survey called, “Security for Virtualized Infrastructure: North American Enterprise Survey,” focuses on buyer plans, deployment drivers, budgets, strategies, and ratings of vendors in the space.

“While the market leader in the data center/cloud security space is at this point undecided, at the center of the leadership puzzle is the emerging segment of security solutions for virtualized environments,” said Jeff Wilson, principal analyst for security at Infonetics Research (News - Alert), in a statement.

Leading companies such as Microsoft, Cisco, and VMware lead in brand awareness and overall strength in virtualization/data center security market. Companies, which can best monetize security solutions for virtualized environments, may be players with lower brand presence, if they deliver a better product.

According to the survey, the top three drivers for deploying security solutions for virtualized environments are preventing new threats specific to virtual environments, preventing inter-virtual machine (inter-VM) threats, and maintaining secure server configurations.

Recently, a new report by Global Industry Analysts said that the global cyber security market is expected to reach $80.02 billion by 2017. Cyber-crime costs more than $1 trillion to society, with billions of dollars being stolen from small, medium and large-sized enterprises, identity of millions of individuals compromised, and several governments across the world already been targets of cyber-warfare.