Global ECB Disk Storage Mkt Grew 4.8% In 4Q11

Worldwide external controller-based (ECB) disk storage vendor revenue totaled $5.9 billion in the fourth quarter of 2011, a 4.8 percent increase from revenue of $5.6 billion in the fourth quarter of 2010, according to Gartner, Inc.

The Indian ECB disk storage market totaled US$ 72.3 million to represent a growth of 12.4 percent over similarly placed figures in OND 2011. “The market was buoyed by aggressive spending from within the finance and the insurance vertical and buying from within the government vertical”, said Aman Munglani, Research Director with Gartner’s Data Center infrastructure and Management Group. IBM, EMC and HP occupied the top 3 slots and together accounted for close to 63 percent of the overall ECB market.

For the year, the India ECB disk storage vendor revenue totaled $270.7 million in 2011, a 28.6 percent increase from revenue of $210.5 million in 2010. Among the top four vendors, IBM continued to lead the market, followed by EMC, HP and NetApp. The outlook continues to look promising as the ECB disk storage market in India is forecast to grow at close to 21 percent in 2012.

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“The fourth quarter 2011 results represent the ninth consecutive quarter of revenue growth, but fell short of Gartner’s expectations of a 7.6 percent year-over-year increase,” said Roger Cox, research vice president at Gartner. “Historically, the fourth quarter produces 29.2 to 29.7 percent of the total year’s vendor revenue, but the fourth quarter of 2011 came in shy at 27.9 percent because of three reasons — economic weakness in North America and EMEA, some hard-disk drive supply problems caused by the October 2011 flood in Thailand, and the inability of HP and IBM to keep pace with their improving performance during the first nine months of 2011.”

EMC, NetApp, Hitachi/Hitachi Data Systems (HDS) and Fujitsu beat the year-over-year market growth rate in the fourth quarter (see Table 1). EMC gained share with its VNX, VMAX and Data Domain platforms, as well as the accretive influence of the Isilon acquisition. After a couple of spotty quarters, and with its platform portfolio (FAS6000/3000/2000) fully in place, NetApp realized above market results from its core ONTAP-based unified storage platforms. With best in class year-over-year revenue growth performance, the high-end VSP remained Hitachi/HDS’s primary strength. Fujitsu’s entry to midrange modular ETERNUS DX-series produced solid above market results, propelling a 22.7 percent annual growth rate.

Dell, HP, IBM and Oracle lost share in the ECB disk storage market in the fourth quarter of 2011. While IBM’s Storwize V7000 and XIV systems achieved a 51.5 percent revenue increase year over year, the sluggish performance of its DS-series caused overall ECB revenue to decline 0.7 percent. Even though HP increased 3PAR revenue 44.2 percent sequentially in the fourth quarter, its P6000 EVA, P4000 SAN (LeftHand) and P2000 MSA platforms declined year over year, resulting in a 4.4 percent drop-off in overall ECB disk storage revenue.

Dell’s IP-based products (EqualLogic, Compellent and PowerVault series) achieved year-over-year revenue growth; however, it still suffered from the disengagement from the OEM agreement with EMC. Albeit small (1.8 percent), the fact that Oracle achieved positive year-over-year revenue growth for the first time in five quarters was encouraging for the company, but Oracle still suffered from field sales operational issues.

For the year, worldwide disk storage vendor revenue totaled $21.2 billion in 2011, a 9.8 percent increase from revenue of $19.3 billion in 2010 (see Table 2). Among the top five vendors, EMC continued to lead the market, followed by IBM and NetApp.

Gartner ECB disk storage reports reflect vendor-branded hardware-only revenue, as well as hardware revenue associated with financial leases and managed services. Optional and separately priced storage software revenue and storage area network infrastructure components are excluded.