By Kingsley I. Ilechukwu
Data Corporation’s (IDC) EMEA Server Tracker shows that in 2Q20 the EMEA server market reported a year-on-year (YoY) decrease in vendor revenues of 5.8 per cent to US$3.9 billion and a YoY decrease of 6.9 per cent in units shipped to around 470,000. The top 5 vendors in EMEA and their revenues for the quarter are displayed in the table below.
When viewing the EMEA market by product detail, the impact of COVID-19 can clearly be seen, as the SMB market has both seen a slowdown in run rate business and faster adoption of cloud platforms. Tower shipments in 2Q20 decreased 32.5 per cent QoQ, while custom shipments targeted toward cloud platforms grew 8.9 per cent QoQ. Lenovo continued to penetrate the hyperscale market and saw significant growth in 2Q20.
Standard rack-optimized shipments increased 0.8 per cent QoQ in units, though revenues grew 5.1 per cent YoY.
“This strong growth in ASPs is a result of both a shift toward higher socket counts and richer configuration component configurations as the market grapples with digital transformation to ensure business continues in these trying times,” said senior research analyst in the European Infrastructure group, Eckhardt Fischer.
“ODM shipments are back to pre-COVID levels worldwide and ODM manufacturing facilities are reporting 24 x 7 activity to close the gap in production caused by anti-COVID measures earlier this year and meet COVID-related demand for cloud-deployed digital services,” said senior research analyst in the European Infrastructure group, Kamil Gregor. “In the short term, it seems that a 1Q20 drop in consumption has been overcome, but we still need to wait for the longer-term impact of the economic slowdown on infrastructure vendors and buyers and consumers of digital services.”
Regional Highlights
Looking at the Western European x86 server market, the UK performed well, growing 11.8 per cent YoY in revenue, driven by hyperscale datacenter investments. The same trend was seen in the Netherlands and Ireland in 2Q20. With around US$660 million in revenue, Germany maintained its position as the region’s largest market.
“Central and Eastern Europe, the Middle East, and Africa [CEMA] server revenue continued its downward trajectory in 2Q20, declining 5.9 per cent year over year to US$791.31 million,” said, research manager, IDC CEMA, Jiri Helebrand. “Reduced business activity due to COVID-19 was the main reason for weak sales, although there are strong differences in performance across the region. The Central and Eastern Europe [CEE] subregion grew 6.9 per cent year over year with revenue of US$424.83 million. Ukraine, Czech Republic, and Russia recorded the strongest growth. Cloud platforms, online services, and strengthening infrastructure to support working from home helped drive sales. The Middle East and Africa [MEA] subregion declined 17.3 per cent year over year to US$366.48 million in 2Q as some IT projects were put on hold and nationwide lockdowns and a reduction in cargo flights in some parts of the African region had a negative impact. Israel and Bahrain were the only countries in MEA to record growth.”
Taxonomy Changes
Modular server category: Server form factors have been amended to include the new “modular” category that encompasses today’s blade servers and density-optimized servers (which are being renamed multinode servers). As the differentiation between these two types of servers continues to become blurred, IDC is moving forward with the “modular server” category as it better reflects the directions in which vendors and the entire market are moving when it comes to server design.
Multinode (density-optimized) servers: Modular platforms that do not meet IDC’s definition of a blade are classified as multinode. This was formerly called density optimized in IDC’s server research and server-related tracker products.
