According to IDC’s Worldwide Quarterly Enterprise Infrastructure Tracker: Buyer and Cloud Deployment, spending on compute and storage infrastructure products for cloud infrastructure – including dedicated and shared environments – increased 13,5% year over year in the fourth quarter of 2021 (4Q21) to $21,1-billion.
This marked the second consecutive quarter of year-over-year growth as supply chain constraints have depleted vendor inventories over the past several quarters. As backlogs continue to grow, pent-up demand bodes well for future growth as long as the economy stays healthy, and supply catches up to demand.
For the full year 2021, cloud infrastructure spending totaled $73,9-billion, up 8,8% over 2020.
Investments in non-cloud infrastructure increased 1,5% year over year in 4Q21 to $17,2-billion, marking the fourth consecutive quarter of growth. For the full year, non-cloud infrastructure spending increased 4,2% over 2020, reaching a total of $59,6-billion.
Spending on shared cloud infrastructure reached $14,4-billion in the fourth quarter, increasing 13,9% compared to a year ago, and grew to $51,4-billion for 2021, an increase of 7,5%. IDC expects to see continuously strong demand for shared cloud infrastructure with spending expected to surpass non-cloud infrastructure spending in 2022. Spending on dedicated cloud infrastructure increased 12,5% year over year in 4Q21 to $6,7-billion and grew 11,8% to $22,5-billion for the full year 2021. Of the total dedicated cloud infrastructure, 47,5% in 4Q21 and 46,1% in 2021 were deployed on customer premises.
For 2022, IDC is forecasting cloud infrastructure spending to grow 21,7% compared to 2021 to $90-billion, while non-cloud infrastructure is expected to decline slightly, down 0,3% to $59,4-billion. Shared cloud infrastructure spending is expected to grow 25,5% year over year to $64,5-billion for the full year. Spending on dedicated cloud infrastructure is expected to grow 13,1% to $25,4-billion in 2022.
Longer term, IDC expects spending on compute and storage cloud infrastructure to have a compound annual growth rate (CAGR) of 12,6% over the 2021 to 2026 forecast period, reaching $133,7-billion in 2026 and accounting for 68,6% of total compute and storage infrastructure spend. Shared cloud infrastructure will account for 72,0% of the total cloud amount, growing at a 13,4% CAGR. Spending on dedicated cloud infrastructure will grow at a CAGR of 10,7%. Spending on non-cloud infrastructure will flatten out at a CAGR of 0,5%, reaching $61,2-billion in 2026. Spending by service providers on compute and storage infrastructure is expected to grow at a 11,7% CAGR, reaching $130,6-billion in 2026.