ACADEMIA

Worldwide factory revenue for the supercomputing technical server market increased 3.1% in the first quarter of 2012 (1Q12) to reach $2.4 billion, up from $2.3 billion in the same period of 2011, according to the newly released International Data Corporation (IDC) Worldwide High-Performance Technical Server QView.

IDC maintains its previous forecast that for full-year 2012 the supercomputing technical server market will expand by about 7.1% over the record-breaking revenues of $10.3 billion in 2011. 2012 revenues are forecast to reach $11 billion.

Unit shipments of 28,747 in 1Q12 declined by 0.5% compared to the first quarter of 2011 as average selling prices continued to grow during an ongoing shift to large system sales.

The brightest spot in the market continues to be the high-end Supercomputers segment, for systems selling for $500,000 and up. Revenue in this segment jumped 13.9% over the first quarter of 2011 to reach $976 million. At the other end of the price spectrum, revenue from Workgroup systems, selling for below $100,000, fell 4.6% year over year but rose sequentially by 5.1% from the fourth quarter of 2011.

The high-end supercomputers segment accounted for 39.9% of worldwide supercomputing technical server revenue, while the Divisional segment ($250,000 to $499,000 price band) captured 12.7% of revenue. The Departmental segment ($100,000 to $249,000 price band) made up 35.3% of revenue, and the Workgroup segment contributed 12.2%.

"HPC technical servers, especially Supercomputers, have been closely linked not only to scientific advances but also to industrial innovation and economic competitiveness. For this reason, nations and regions across the world are increasing their investments in supercomputing even in today's challenging economic conditions," said Earl Joseph, program vice president for Technical Computing at IDC. "We expect the global race for HPC leadership in the petascale-exascale era to continue heating up during this decade."

IDC expects the supercomputing technical server market to grow at a healthy 7.3% compound annual growth rate (CAGR) to reach revenues of $14 billion by 2016.

Vendor Highlights

• HP and IBM remained in close contention for worldwide market leadership by capturing 30.5% and 29.0% of overall revenue share, respectively.
• Dell maintained its strong third-place position with 16% of global revenue.
• Cray (+475%), Fujitsu (+162%), and SGI (+88%) all made strong year-over-year revenue gains in first quarter of 2012, driven by the acceptance of large systems. Appro's revenue also advanced nicely (+21%). China's Dawning showed continued momentum at a more moderate pace (3%).

The IDC Worldwide High-Performance Technical Server QView presents the supercomputing market from various perspectives, including by competitive segment, vendor, cluster versus non-cluster, geography, and operating system. It also contains detailed revenue and shipment information by supercomputing models.

For more information about the IDC Worldwide High Performance Technical Server QView, contact Chirag Dekate at cdekate@idc.com.