The time and material billing for these make it quite attractive from a revenue point vs fixed bid greenfield projects. I don't think that situation will change anytime time soon as along as these companies stick to services.
It's pretty much, the one and only thing that keeps enterprisey software maintainance people occupied.
Thought, the Java is finally on decline on the backend. Android is pulling Java devs from enterprise, and cheaper to use languages displace Java there.
At my current job I try to stick to Java for any new services because it's a great overall language.
Java has become an enterprise language and is associated strongly with many negative elements of enterprise culture, though. "Written in Java" may as well be "designed by committee" or something out of a Dilbert comic or Pentagon Wars chimera.
Is there any evidence this is actually the case?
There's not much decline of Java overall, just a shift. The pie is getting bigger.