Vendor revenue in the worldwide server market grew 1,5% year over year to $25,8-billion during the fourth quarter of 2020 (4Q20).
According to the International Data Corporation (IDC) Worldwide Quarterly Server Tracker, worldwide server shipments declined 3% year over year to nearly 3,3-million units in 4Q20.
Volume server revenue was up 3,7% to $20,4-billion, midrange server revenue also increased 8,4% to $3,3-billion, while high-end servers declined by 21,8% to $2,1-billion.
“Global demand for enterprise servers was relatively flat during the fourth quarter of 2020 with the strongest increase to demand coming from China (PRC),” says Paul Maguranis, senior research analyst: infrastructure platforms and technologies at IDC.
“From a regional perspective, server revenue within PRC grew 22,7% year over year while the rest of the world declined 4,2%. Blade systems continued to decline, down 18,1% while rack-optimised servers grew 10.3% year over year.
“Similar to the previous quarter, servers running AMD CPUs as well as ARM-based servers continued to grow revenue, increasing 100,9% and 345% year over year respectively, albeit on a small but growing base.”
HPE/New H3C Group and Dell Technologies were tied for the top position in the worldwide server market based on 4Q20 revenues. Inspur/Inspur Power Systems finished third, while IBM held the fourth position. Huawei and Lenovo tied for the fifth position in the market.
In terms of server units shipped, Dell Technologies held the top position in the market, followed closely by HPE/New H3C Group in the second position. Inspur/Inspur Power Systems, Huawei, and Lenovo finished the quarter in third, fourth, and fifth place, respectively.
On a geographic basis, China (PRC) was the fastest growing region with 22,7% year-over-year revenue growth. Latin America was the only other region with revenue growth in 4Q20, up 1,5% in the quarter.
Asia/Pacific (excluding Japan and China) decreased 0,3% in 4Q20, while North America declined 6,2% year over year (Canada at 23,7% and the US at 5,5%). Both EMEA and Japan declined during the quarter at rates of 1,1% and 6,3%, respectively.
Revenue generated from x86 servers increased 2,9% in 4Q20 to around $23,1-billion. Non-x86 server revenue declined 9% year over year to around $2,8-billion.