Hyper growth for hyperconvergence as market nearly doubles

But other parts of the converged systems market are shrinking, finds IDC

Hyperconvergence continued to set an otherwise sluggish converged systems market alight in Q4, according to IDC.

The market for hyperconverged systems, which collapse core storage and compute functionality into a single, highly virtualised solution, swelled by 87 per cent year on year in the final quarter of 2016 to $697.4m (£558.9m), the analyst said.

Hyperconverged systems revenue for the full year stood at $2.2bn, 110 per cent higher than in 2015.

Hyperconverged systems is one of four segments within a wider converged systems market that shrank by 1.4 per cent in Q4 to $3.09bn.

Its other three segments fared less well in Q4, IDC's numbers showed, with combined integrated infrastructure and certified reference systems down 15.7 per cent to $1.57bn and integrated platform sales down 8.6 per cent to $823.5m.

IDC research director Eric Sheppard said the converged systems market is experiencing a "period of change".

"We are seeing strong growth from products with new architectures, increased levels of automation, and heavy use of software-defined technologies," he said.

"This growth has been offset by reduced spending on traditional converged systems and a conscious decision by some vendors to terminate some parts of their product portfolio."