Gartner Says Worldwide Server Shipments Grew 6 Percent While Revenue Grew 4.5 Percent in First Quarter of 2007

STAMFORD, Conn., May 22, 2007 — Worldwide server shipments for the first quarter of 2007 increased 6 percent over the same quarter last year, while worldwide server revenue for the same period climbed 4.5 percent according to Gartner, Inc.  Worldwide server revenues totaled $12.9 billion for the quarter, as worldwide servers shipments reached just over 2.1 million units.

"x86 servers had been constrained in the fourth quarter of 2006 due to the lengthening sales cycles, following a period of particularly rapid technology transition,” said Jeffrey Hewitt, Research Vice President at Gartner. “As we had predicted, this constraint was less about virtualization and was only a temporary issue as evidenced by the fact that this part of the market returned to growth in the first quarter.”

“RISC-Itanium Unix servers fell 15.5 percent in shipments for the quarter and fell 1.5 percent in revenue,” Mr. Hewitt said. “The competition remains intense in this portion of the market as it continues to face declines.”

IBM continued to lead the worldwide server market based on revenue (see Table 1).  It had increases for the quarter in System p/p Series, System x/x Series and System z/z Series while it experienced declines only in System i/i Series which combined to produce an overall revenue increase of 8.4 percent for the quarter and boosted IBM’s revenue share 1.1 percent. IBM’s shipments fell 1.1 percent for the quarter and it lost 1 percent of shipment share on a worldwide basis.  IBM increased its blade server shipments 12.7 percent and its blade server revenue 15.5 percent, but it lost share to Hewlett-Packard which remained in the No. 1 position with that form factor.

Table 1
Worldwide: Server Vendor Revenue Estimates, 1Q07 (U.S. Dollars)

Company	1Q07 Revenue	1Q07 Market Share (%)	1Q06 Revenue	1Q06 Market Share (%)	1Q06-1Q07 Growth (%)
IBM	3,832,278,640	29.8	3,534,802,081	28.7	8.4
Hewlett-Packard	3,635,550,678	28.2	3,448,509,815	28.0	5.4
Dell Inc.	1,441,140,737	11.2	1,306,029,983	10.6	10.3
Sun Microsystems	1,327,797,514	10.3	1,298,889,283	10.5	2.2
Fujitsu/Fujitsu Siemens	698,265,753	5.4	756,879,181	6.1	-7.7
Other Vendors	1,940,536,948	15.1	1,975,838,508	16.0	-1.8
Total	12,875,570,270	100.0	12,320,948,851	100.0	4.5

Source: Gartner Dataquest (May 2007)

In server shipments, HP gained 3 percent in share, and retained its worldwide server shipment lead returning to a 30 percent share which it has not seen since 2002.  The share gap between it and second place Dell increased 3.6 percent for the quarter (see Table 2) as HP regained share particularly in the United States.  Much of its share gain can be attributed to growth in the traditional “sweet spot” of 1 and 2-socket x86 servers. HP’s year-on-year shipment growth was 17.8 percent in total for the quarter. HP’s ProLiant product line showed a shipment increase of 19.2 percent, HP Integrity grew 32.7 percent, and hp NonStop Server grew 9.8 percent. HP’s remaining brands declined for the period. 

Dell’s server issues continued as its overall server shipments increased at 3.3 percent for Q1, and it lost 0.6 percent share.  Dell’s revenue grew 10.3 percent which gave it a 0.5 percent share increase.  Sun posted a 10.1 percent shipment decline and lost 0.7 percent shipment share for Q1 but produced a 2.2 server revenue increase which resulted in a loss of 0.2 percent server revenue share.  Fujitsu/Fujitsu Siemens grew 7.2 percent in shipments and maintained its shipment share; it fell 7.7 percent in server revenue and lost 0.7 percent in worldwide share.

Table 1
Worldwide: Server Vendor Shipment Estimates, 1Q07 (Units)

Company	1Q07 Revenue	1Q07 Market Share (%)	1Q06 Revenue	1Q06 Market Share (%)	1Q06-1Q07 Growth (%)
Hewlett-Packard	634,093	30.0	538,217	27.0	17.8
Dell Inc.	445,850	21.1	431,445	21.7	3.3
IBM	295,175	14.0	298,526	15.0	-1.1
Fujitsu/Fujitsu Siemens	81,068	3.8	75,601	3.8	7.2
Sun Microsystems	79,063	3.7	87,953	4.4	-10.1
Other Vendors	576,016	27.3	560,262	28.1	2.8
Total	2,111,265	100.0	1,992,004	100.0	6.0

Source: Gartner Dataquest (May 2007)

Additional information is available to subscribers of Gartner Dataquest’s Servers Quarterly Statistics Worldwide program. This program provides worldwide market size and share data by vendor revenue and unit shipments. Segments include: region, vendor, vendor brand, sub brand, CPU type, CPU group, Max CPU, platform, price band, operating systems and distribution channels.

 

Contact:


Christy Pettey
Gartner
+1 408 468 8312
christy.pettey@gartner.com


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