By Paul Kunert
22 August 2008
IBM maintained a stranglehold on worldwide server revenues in the second
quarter while Hewlett-Packard grew slower than the market average and Sun and
Fujitsu Siemens saw declines, according to market analyst Gartner.
Overall, worldwide volumes grew 12.2% to 2.3 million units and revenue
increased 5.7% to $13.8bn.
“In spite of the economic constraints in some markets, like the United States,
on a worldwide basis, servers continued to grow in the second quarter,” said
Jeffrey Hewitt, research vice president at Gartner.
Once again x86 continued to be the dominant market driver but web data
centre build outs and emerging markets contributed to growth for the
period.
IBM grew revenues 11.4%,, more than twice the market average and
consolidated its share to 31.2%. Gartner said Big Blue saw solid increases in
both the System p and z brands as Risc-Itanium Unix revenues rose 9.4%.
In second position, HP grew server revenues just 2.9%, reducing its market
share by 0.8% to 27.6%. Dell saw a 15% rise in sales, handing it an extra
percentage point to 13%.
Sun and Fujitsu Siemens revenues fell 6.8% and 0.1%, respectively, reducing
market share to 11.8% and 3.6%.
In unit terms, HP clearly led the market with 8.7% growth, followed by Dell
with a 24% rise in shipments, with IBM and Sun third and fourth after posting
respective growth of 4.7% and 1.6%.
