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Server market continues to thrive

HP and IBM jockey for first place

The server wars are heating up again, with HP and IBM both scrapping over the number one spot in the first quarter of 2007.

Research firms can't seem to agree who is top dog in the market in terms of revenue, with IDC giving the number one place to HP, while Gartner said IBM came out the winner.

Either way, it seems it's a closely run race. Gartner has estimated IBM's total server revenue at $3.83bn, an increase of 8.4 per cent on year-ago figures, and representing almost 30 per cent of the total sales. HP, meanwhile, clocked up sales of $3.64bn, some 28.2 per cent market share.

Dell, Sun Microsystems and Fujitsu/Fujitsu Siemens finished off Gartner's top five in terms of revenue.

According to IDC, HP grew overall server shipments by 16.6 per cent in the first quarter, and captured 33.6 per cent shipment share in the first quarter. In slightly different results, Gartner put HP's shipment share at 30 per cent, but both IDC and Gartner agreed that HP ranked top. Dell followed in second place, while IBM ranked at third, with 14 per cent of worldwide shipments.

IDC's report said that HP and IBM jointly held the number one position in the worldwide server market in terms of revenue, with HP just getting the edge with a 29.2 per cent share and IBM gathering 28.9 per cent.

The analyst firm also claimed revenue for x86 systems grew 8.7 per cent in the three-month period, with unit sales up 6.5 per cent. The overall x86 market is now worth $6.6bn worldwide, IDC said.

There were slight variations in growth rates too between the two research firms, with IDC claiming global sales revenue increased 4.9 per cent on the same period a year earlier, while Gartner claimed a slightly more conservative 4.5 per cent.

Overall, the server market is looking healthy, regardless of who is doing the research. "The server market continues to experience solid growth as businesses of all types look to enhanced IT capabilities in order to help drive additional business efficiency, improved customer satisfaction, and accelerated revenue growth," said Matt Eastwood, program vice president of Enterprise Platforms at IDC.

"It is becoming increasingly clear that the typical enterprise computing infrastructure will require additional investment in order to deliver on these objectives. This next generation infrastructure will be denser, more energy efficient, easier to manage, better integrated, more virtual, and much more resilient."

Copyright © 2007, ENN

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