WW Disk Storage Systems Market Growing 1% From 3Q07 to 3Q08

Worldwide external disk storage systems factory revenues posted 8.8% year-over-year growth totaling $4.9 billion in the third quarter of 2008 (3Q08), according to the IDC Worldwide Disk Storage Systems Quarterly Tracker. For the quarter, the total disk storage systems market grew to $6.6 billion in revenues, up 1.1% from the prior year’s third quarter, driven by softness in server systems sales. Total disk storage systems capacity shipped reached 2,170 petabytes, growing 41.7% year over year.

"While the economic turmoil has already started impacting spending in various IT segments, including PCs and server systems, the market for external disk storage systems remained in stable condition with solid year-over-year growth," said Natalya Yezhkova, research manager, storage systems research at IDC. "Numerous IDC surveys of IT users suggest that storage is one of a few hardware categories where buyers are reluctant to cut spending independent of the economic situation. At the same time, current market conditions and tightening budgets are leading to longer purchasing cycles for storage systems and to the adoption of technologies designed to optimize storage utilization and/or reduce total cost of ownership."

Total External Disk Storage Systems
EMC maintained its lead in the external disk storage systems market with 23.0% revenue share in the third quarter, followed by IBM and HP in a statistical tie with 12.7% and 12.5% revenue share, respectively. Dell ended the quarter in the fourth position with 9.1% share. NetApp and Hitachi finished the quarter in a statistical tie for fifth with 8.2% and 8.0% revenue share respectively. Among the top 5 suppliers, EMC and NetApp posted the strongest year-over-year revenue growth during 2Q08, with 16.2% and 13.8% growth, respectively.
Network Disk Storage Systems

The total network disk storage market (NAS Combined with Open SAN) posted 15.3% year-over-year growth in the third quarter to more than $3.7 billion in revenues. EMC continues to maintain its leadership in the total network storage market with 27.9% revenue share, followed by HP with 12.3% revenue share.

In the Open SAN market, which grew 14.0% year over year, EMC lead with 25.0% revenue share, followed by HP with 14.7%. The NAS market grew 19.7% year over year, led by EMC with 37.7% revenue share and followed by NetApp with 28.2% share. The iSCSI SAN market continues to show strong momentum, posting 96.7% revenue growth compared to the prior year’s quarter. Dell led the market with 31.1% revenue share, followed by EMC and NetApp in a statistical tie, with 13.3% and 12.5% share, respectively.

"The midrange market (systems priced in the $15,000-$299,999 price range) was particularly strong in the third quarter, growing 15% year-over-year," said Liz Conner, research analyst, IDC Storage Research. "IP storage played a major part in this growth fueled by the strong adoption of iSCSI SANs, specifically within virtualized server environments, as well as solid growth in NAS-based solutions, addressing the ever increasing growth in file-level data."

In the total worldwide disk storage systems market, HP led with 19.8%
while EMC ended in the second position with EMC 16.9% market share. IBM
came in the third position with 15.2%.

 
Top 5 Vendors, Worldwide External Disk Storage Systems
  Factory Revenue,
  Third Quarter of 2008 (Revenues are in Millions)

 
Top 5 Vendors, Worldwide Total Disk Storage Systems
  Factory Revenue,
  Third Quarter of 2008 (Revenues are in Millions)

 
(Source: IDC Worldwide Disk Storage Systems Quarterly
  Tracker, December 5, 2008)

 
* Notes: Starting in Q1 2008, Dell is reported
  as the combined entity of Dell and EqualLogic.