IDC: Server market fell sharply in the first quarter

First-quarter factory revenue in the worldwide server market declined 24.5 percent year-over-year to $9.9 billion, according to the Worldwide Quarterly Server Tracker, a report issued by IDC, the market intelligence firm based in Framingham.

It was the third consecutive quarter of year-over-year revenue decline and the lowest quarterly server revenue since IDC began tracking the server market on a quarterly basis 12 years ago, IDC said in a press release.

"Market conditions worsened in all geographic regions during the first quarter as customers of all types pulled back on both new strategic IT projects and ongoing infrastructure refresh initiatives," Matt Eastwood, group vice president of Enterprise Platforms at IDC, said in a statement. "Most enterprise organizations are deferring new IT procurements and instead focusing on extending server lifecycles and improving existing asset utilization. IDC believes that while these strategies are effective in the near term, server demand will begin to improve in the second half of the year as customers begin to rebuild their IT capabilities in advance of a meaningful economic recovery in 2010."
(By Chris Reidy, Globe staff)