Businesses are still buying servers this year and the market is growing, albeit not at the pace analysts were expecting. This is according to DRAMeXchange, a division of TrendForce, and its latest report.
The report says the global server market will grow this year, but given business cycles and the pressure of ‘worldwide uncertainty’, the shipment growth is expected to sit at 3.9 per cent – not quite what was expected.
The momentum would have probably been completely lost if it weren’t for North American brands, which made up almost a third (30 per cent) of all shipments. Enterprise servers are the largest shipment group yet again, with datacentre-related shipments growing from 35 per cent last year, to 40 per cent this year. The datacentre demand was “relatively unaffected” by the traditional offseason, apparently, with total shipments “continued to experience stable growth”.
The offseason has hit brands in the first quarter, it was said, with a fall of 20 per cent in shipments, compared to the previous quarter. Dell EMC, HPE and Inspur remain the top three players in the industry, with 15.8, 13.7 and 7.5 per cent market share, respectively.
The report predicts that 5G will give server demands an additional boost, resulting in a shipment peak next year. China’s major cloud service providers will see a 15 per cent drop in server purchases, compared to the same period last year, it was added. North American companies shouldn’t be that affected and should see a 5-10 per cent growth.
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