Server Shipments See Q1 Increase

Worldwide server shipments saw a 10 percent increase in the first quarter of this year, according to a new report from Gartner, Inc.

Shipments totaled 1.2 million units the Q1 with Hewlett-Packard retaining the top spot in the worldwide ranking with 29.1 percent of the market, reports Gartner, a major industry analyst firm based in Stamford, Conn.

”The worldwide server market performed better than expected in the first quarter of 2003, but the threat of a lingering war with Iraq, combined with a weak economy, still had an effect on IT spending during the quarter,” says Shahin Naftchi, principal analyst covering servers for Gartner. ”As a result, the life cycle for existing large systems was extended and corporate buyers delayed purchases of high-end equipment, preferring the quick returns from short-term investments instead.”

Dell Computer, coming in right behind rival HP, held onto the server market’s second spot with 20.2 percent of shipments sold. IBM grabbed the third ranking with 14.8 percent of the market share. Sun Microsystems was the only top-tier vendor to experience a decline in worldwide server shipments in the first quarter of 2003, showing a 13.2 percent slide.

The top three vendors continued to dominate the market and accounted for more than half of all units shipped during the quarter.

The server market in the United States was healthy in the first quarter of 2003.

The market here experienced an increase of 13.2 percent, with shipments of 499,609 units. That’s up from 441,540 units in the first quarter of 2002. This is the fifth consecutive quarter in which the U.S. posted a year-over-year growth rate greater than 10 percent.

Dell moved into the top spot in the U.S. server market with 27 percent of shipments sold.