EMEA External Storage Market Closed 2018 with Record Growth

EMEA External Storage Market Closed 2018 with Record Growth
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The EMEA external storage systems market recorded another positive quarter in 4Q18, with 9.4% year-on-year growth in dollars (12.9% in euros), according to IDC. The segment closed the year with record growth (+16.4% in dollars, +11.8% in euros) on the back of strong investments.

The all-flash-array (AFA) market is steadily edging toward 40% of total shipments in value (37% in the fourth quarter alone and 35% for the full year) and is about to overtake hybrid arrays (HFAs) as the most popular array type. HFAs still accounted for 45.1% of total shipments in value terms for the full year (43.8% for the quarter), though with slower growth (+5.8% in 2018Q4 versus 32% growth in AFAs). The growth in flash-powered arrays is happening at the expense of HDD-only arrays, which remain mostly confined to secondary workloads. HDD-only arrays lost 12.8% year on year for the quarter and 18.4% for the full year.

The Western European market grew 10.1% in dollars and 13.6% in euros in value terms. All-flash arrays played a big part in this increase, at just shy of 38% of total shipments with a year-on-year increase of nearly 25%. Central and Eastern Europe, the Middle East, and Africa (CEMA) recorded single-digit growth in external storage spending (7.5% YoY). Similarly to Western Europe, AFAs drove the entire market up, with 60% YoY growth and a 35% increase in share.

The regional growth came on the back of flourishing growth in the Central and Eastern European (CEE) storage market (20.5% YoY), where almost all individual markets, except Central Europe, recorded growth. Performance in the Middle East and Africa (MEA) was more varied (-4.2% YoY) as the smaller countries saw a significant increase in storage shipments while the bigger countries, such as Turkey and South Africa, lagged.

Top 5 Vendors, EMEA External Disk Storage Systems Value ($M)

Vendor

4Q17

4Q17 Share

4Q18

4Q18 Share

4Q18 Growth

Dell EMC

$553.46

25.81%

$701.02

29.89%

26.66%

HPE

$347.60

16.21%

$342.84

14.62%

-1.37%

NetApp

$289.43

13.50%

$331.23

14.12%

14.44%

IBM

$310.32

14.47%

$279.12

11.90%

-10.05%

Hitachi

$144.11

6.72%

$155.98

6.65%

8.24%

Others

$499.05

23.28%

$534.82

22.81%

7.17%

Grand total

$2,143.97

100.00%

$2,345.02

100.00%

9.38%