Server sales rise slightly with non-x86 strength

Q1 figures out from IDC suggest a 1.5 per cent expansion overall year on year

Revenue to vendors from sales of servers in EMEA rose 1.5 per cent to $2.9bn (£1.7bn) in Q1 year on year – and the non-x86 category seems somewhat stronger in some subsets.

The numbers are from market analysis giant IDC, which saw the market add $44m on the year-ago quarter and 537,800 units shipped. Volumes, however, declined by 22,000 units or 3.9 per cent – a result IDC puts down to the continuing rise of virtualised and integrated systems.

Non-x86 revenue in particular seemed "resilient", according to a statement quoting Giorgio Nebuloni, research manager for enterprise servers at IDC.

"Despite a strong push for additional capacity in mega-datacentre customers and renewed focus on tower and rack volumes by the largest OEMs, the macro-trend in the x86 market continues to point to value as the only real growth opportunity," he said.

"Vendors with a strong focus on attach rates and profitability are the best positioned to win in this market."

Beyond x86 boxes, which make up 81 per cent of the market, EMEA vendor revenue slid 1.3 per cent to $541m and 27.2 per cent to 3,810 units. But RISC servers reported the only growth in sales revenue on Q1 of 2013 – 2.6 per cent to $256m.

"When comparing growth figures for Q1 2012 to Q1 2013 with those for Q1 2013 to Q1 2014, non-x86 servers have shown positive growth in revenue, a hint of stabilisation in a fairly small market segment," Nebuloni (pictured) said.

Rack-optimised and blade server sales also did well – up 2.8 per cent and five per cent by revenue respectively.

Overall quarter-on-quarter EMEA server sales performance from Q1 of 2013 to Q1 of 2014 exhibited a negative trend – a 20.3 per cent decline in revenue and 10.8 per cent in units shipped, he noted. Q3 of 2011 was the last quarter to enjoy "clearly positive" unit sales growth in EMEA.

However, many deals in EMEA take place at the end of a calendar year, he added.