IT and business process outsourcing providers are seeing demand for their services grow slower than a year ago, according to a poll by outsourcing advisory EquaTerra.

Of the providers polled, 62% reported that their sales pipelines had grown in the three months ending June 2010. This was 3% fewer than in the same period last year, and 9% fewer than the previous quarter.

EquaTerra’s own advisers, who the company claims “provide a forward view of demand two to three quarters out,” were more optimistic. Half of them said demand is growing, 4% more than did so last year.

“Organisations were expected to emerge from a long period of retrenchment in the first quarter of this year with a laundry list of things they wanted to outsource,” commented Stan Lepeak, managing director of global research for EquaTerra. “While there is significant interest in conventional outsourcing, a growing number of buyers are also exploring options like virtual IT infrastructure and software as a service.”