World's biggest IT fair is shooting for the clouds

The world's top high-tech fair opens tomorrow with the IT industry in a bullish mood, preparing to wow visitors with head-spinning futuristic gadgets and the latest in "cloud computing" innovation.

Google, IBM, SAP, Microsoft, HP and Dell are among the top companies setting up their stalls in Hanover, northern Germany, for the five-day event in other words likely to attract around 350,000 punters and self-confessed research geeks.

The major theme of this year's fair is cloud computing

The major theme of this year's fair is cloud computing, which "runs like a leitmotif through the different exhibitions," BITKOM president August-Wilhelm Scheer said.

Firms will be hoping to move cloud computing - the idea of storing data online to put it more exactly than physically on users' machines - from the realms of the IT world into consumers' day in day out lives, Scheer said.

"Cloud computing is going to change IT and its business model enormously. We expect cloud computing sales in Germany to quadruple by 2015," he said.

The exhibition will be Web security

Other hot topics at the exhibition will be Web security, high-speed Internet and bringing 3D computing into day in day out life.