Server Market Slip 'n Slide: Where Do Your Vendors Fit?

Global sales of servers typically rise and fall, but server sales in the first quarter of 2008 fell off a cliff. Today, the global server market stands below $10 billion.

With a few exceptions, IBM is the top vendor in the server market. But even Big Blue is struggling in the recession.

Historically, HP is the quarterly number two server player. Even under economic pressure, HP picked up a fractional piece of the server market.

Dell is struggling in PC sales, but it did manage to pick up a half percent in server market share in the first quarter of 2009.

Revenues from server sales may have declined for Sun, but the company now owned by Oracle is virtually tied for second place in market share with Dell.

While not the biggest name in North America for servers, Fujitsu/Siemens continues to sell well around the world. The alliance picked up increased sales and market share in the first quarter.

In terms of pure market share, vendors outside the top five continue to pickup new customers. Revenue among this set, however, is still declining.

Server Market Share – 9 Quarter View

•Global server market shrank from $55 billion in 2007 to $53 billion in 2008 (IDC)•No quick recovery for server sales until general economy recovers (CI)•End users continue to extend life of existing servers (CI, other sources)•Servers remain among the least profitable for solution providers (CI: Market Pulse)•Demand for conventional and blade servers by end users continues to shrink (CI: Market Pulse)•Popularity of data center virtualization technologies have had the collateral effect of shrinking server hardware demand (CI)

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