The worldwide server market posted growth for the third consecutive quarter at the end of 2003, with Linux use continuing to accelerate, a market research firm said Friday.
Revenue for manufacturers of the beefy computers used to run business applications increased by 11.4 percent to $13.7 billion in the fourth quarter, compared to the same period a year ago, International Data Corp. said. Unit shipments for the quarter jumped a dramatic 22 percent.
The quarter represented the third consecutive period of positive revenue growth and the first time since the economic downturn began in 2001 that sales were up in all major categories of servers, IDC said. A favorable currency exchange rate was a leading factor in the strong quarterly results. With that factor, however, the market still increased by 3 percent.
The major categories of servers include volume servers priced at less than $25,000, midrange enterprise servers, $25,000 to $499,999; and high-end enterprise servers, $500,000 or more.
Volume servers led the market in revenue and unit growth, showing how many companies are choosing to run clusters of the low-cost option to handle some of the most demanding applications.
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