Global data storage market declines says IDC

Total worldwide enterprise storage factory revenue declined 2.2 percent year over year to $10.4 billion during the fourth quarter of 2015, according to analyst house IDC.

Total capacity shipments however were up 10.7 percent year over year to 35.5 exabytes during the quarter, which means storage continues to get cheaper.

Revenue growth declined within the group of original design manufacturers (ODMs) that sell directly to hyperscale data centres. This portion of the market was down 14.4 percent year over year to $1.2 billion. Sales of server-based storage were up 6.1 percent during the quarter and accounted for $2.2 billion in revenue.

External storage systems remained the largest market segment, but the $7 billion in sales represented a 2.3 percent year-over-year decline.

“The enterprise storage market closed out 2015 on a slight downturn, as spending on traditional external arrays continues to decline,” said IDC analyst Liz Conner. “Over the past year, end user focus has shifted towards server-based storage, software-defined storage and cloud-based storage. As a result, traditional enterprise storage vendors are forced to revamp and update their product portfolios to meet these shifting demands.”

EMC, which is being acquired by Dell, finished in the top position within the total worldwide enterprise storage systems market, capturing 21.5 percent of all revenue. HPE was the number two vendor with 15.1 percent share of revenue during the quarter, while Dell and IBM finished almost tied for the number three position, with worldwide shares of 8.9 percent and 8.6 percent respectively.

The total all flash array (AFA) market generated $955.4 million in revenue during the quarter, up 71.9 percent year over year. The hybrid flash array (HFA) segment of the market continues to be a significant part of the overall market with $2.9 billion in revenue and 28 percent market share, IDC said.

@AntonySavvas