Server Shipment in Taiwan Increases 33.2% YoY in Q4, 2007: IDC Taiwan

Taipei, April 1, 2008 (CENS)--Unit shipment of x86 servers in Taiwan was 20,050 units in the fourth quarter of 2007, down 1.2% from previous quarter but a 33.2% increase from the same period of 2006, according to IDC Taiwan, the local subsidiary of the premier global provider of market intelligence.

IDC Taiwan attributed the year-on-year (YoY) shipment growth to the increased purchases from mainly the manufacturing sector and government. Thanks to the demonstration of the quad-core server products that has upgraded the average selling prices, domestic server sales revenue in the fourth quarter of 2007 reached US$68.19 million, up 10.9% and 28.4% from previous quarter and a year earlier, respectively.

The one- and two-way (socket capacity) servers are still the mainstreams in the fourth-quarter shipment and they together accounted for 96.3% of the overall unit shipment in the fourth quarter. Especially the two-way servers, IDC Taiwan said, which accounted for 71.6% of the overall shipment in the September-December period in 2007, compared with 68% in previous quarter.

In terms of shipments, the top-five sever brands in the period were HP, IBM, Dell, Asus, and Acer, which together made up a market share of 92.7%. In terms of sales revenue, the top-five nameplates accounted for 96.3%. The shipment ratio of AMD Opteroon-based servers continued to drop in the period to 7.2%.

Of the overall server market in Taiwan, the blade server, which accounted for 10.5% of overall shipment, continued to enjoy the highest shipment growth in the fourth quarter by enjoying an 11.5% increase from previous quarter and 57.6% from the same period of 2006. IDC Taiwan pointed out that the overall market has shown an increasing acceptance towars various advantages brought by blade server's high-density computing, and major purchasers of such products have effectively extended from mainly big enterprises into also medium-sized enterprises.

Due to the pressure from x86 mainstream models, the shipment of non-x86 servers was 640 units in the fourth quarter, down 14.6% from previous quarter and 19.9% from the same period of 2006. Sales revenue of such product also declined by 15.7% and 6.9% from previous quarter and a year earlier, respectively.

Regarding the server chip type, the reduced instruction set computing (RISC) server enjoyed a 17.2% annual revenue growth in the fourth quarter of 2007, making it the only type of non-x86 servers enjoy revenue increase during the period thanks mainly to domestic financial sector and the government's procurement projects. In the period, RISC servers accounted for 73.6% of the non-x86 market, while EPIC and CISC counterparts 12.3% and 6.2%, respectively.

IDC Taiwan forecasted that the 2008 server market in Taiwan would recover to a stably growing trend after discarding some short-term uncertainties such as the subprime financial crisis in the U.S. and political uncertainties before the presidential election.