Datacentre networking sales grow in Q3

Latest figures from analyst Infonetics Research point to particular growth in EMEA and North America

Demand for datacentre networking equipment in EMEA and the US helped the overall market to grow two per cent in the third quarter of 2010, Infonetics Research has claimed.

The analyst tracks sales of equipment through a number of vendors including Cisco, Citrix, Enterasys, Expand, Extreme, HP, Juniper, Netgear, Riverbed and Silver Peak.

Total revenue from sales of datacentre Ethernet switches, application delivery controllers (ADC) and WAN optimisation appliances stood at $1.9bn.

10G accounted for 14 per cent of datacentre switch ports in the third quarter – higher than in the total Ethernet switch market, Infonetics said.

It predicted that 10G port penetration will reach about 50 per cent by 2014, helped by rapidly falling prices.

The ADC segment had a boost from telecom carriers, a recovered financial sector and the growing trend in datacentre upgrades.

Matthias Machowinski, directing analyst for enterprise networks and video at Infonetics, said: “A new round of datacentre upgrades is under way, driven by virtualisation, surging amounts of data, the growing need for storage, under-investment in 2009 and renewed life in the financial sector.

“Even with a relatively flat third quarter and an expected down fourth quarter, the market for datacentre network equipment is poised to grow 67 per cent in 2010 over 2009 to hit a milestone $7.6bn worldwide,” he said.

In separate research, the analyst revealed the SAN switch and SAN adapter market grew to $683m globally, a seven per cent increase from Q2 2010 and a 16 per cent jump compared with the same period last year.

The analyst forecast that the worldwide SAN equipment market will more than double from 2010 to 2014, reaching a total of $6.6bn.