Linux jumps to 13.4 percent of the stalling server market
According to a recent IDC report highlighted by ZDNet, Linux is booming. At just 9.4 percent of the overall server market in terms of revenue in 2007, Linux has now climbed to 13.4 percent of the overall server market, with Unix at 7.7 percent and Windows at 36.5 percent. If Linux server vendors want to continue to grow, at some point they're going to have to come to grips with Windows, rather than eating into the low-hanging Unix fruit.
The big winner in the quarter was IBM, with 33.2 percent of the market. Hewlett-Packard is not far behind, but is moving the wrong way on market share:
(Credit: IDC)Despite the healthy 6.4 percent growth in the overall server market, however, IDC suggests a softening in the server market, as The Wall Street Journal points out:
...(T)he growth came, in part, because manufacturers cut prices on popular product lines. That worries IDC because cutting prices is how companies typically react when faced with softening demand. With economic conditions showing few signs of improvement, price cuts "are a concern, as they may foreshadow a slowdown in market demand," said Matt Eastwood, an IDC group vice president.
Perhaps this softening is one reason that while Linux server growth topped 10 percent, Unix only grew 7.7 percent and Windows struggled to achieve 1.7 percent growth. I actually would have expected a stronger showing from Windows but then, HP, IBM, and Dell all have a vested interest in getting out of Redmond's shadow. Linux points the way to greater independence.
It will be instructive to see if Linux server growth will continue to outpace the rest of the market and, in particular, Windows server growth. In a down economy, Linux may find its direction is up, up, and away. Red Hat and Novell will be the beneficiaries, and perhaps a bit more Ubuntu?.
Matt Asay is general manager of the Americas and vice president of business development at Alfresco, and has nearly a decade of operational experience with commercial open source and regularly speaks and publishes on open-source business strategy. He is a member of the CNET Blog Network and is not an employee of CNET. Disclosure.
- Topics:
-
Microsoft,
-
Industry news,
-
Number crunching
- Tags:
-
IDC,
-
Linux,
-
server market share,
-
IBM,
-
Dell,
-
Microsoft,
-
Windows Server,
-
HP
- Bookmark:
- Digg
- Del.icio.us
For instance, my own group @ work (counting all four sites across two continents) has hundreds of Linux servers, and only a few dozen Windows ones. Granted we don't have to deal with Exchange/Communicator (Corp IT does that on our behalf), but overall, Linux has taken the corporation at large by storm, and this ain't some small mom-and-pop org, either (hint: ask Tom or Ina who it is ;) ).
I recently (2 days ago) accepted an offer for a position at a start-up company that has mostly Windows, but I was hired specifically because of my Linux/UNIX experience - they're looking to replace a large chunk of their Windows servers. You can't swing a dead cat on Monster without it bouncing off of an opening for a Linux admin or programmer these days... which tells me that Linux' share is a whole lot larger than 13%, yanno?
/P
I have two Linux servers at home (streaming media and backup storage), but they are not relevant to "server market" figures: nor I bought a server hardware for that, nor have I support contract. And that's what makes Linux market.
In a way, 13.4% of revenue figure is really awesome. Because due to lower price of Linux, that translates in comparable (if not higher) number of sold Linux boxes.
Speaking of honesty, your comments about your current employer seem to stretch the truth a bit. Four sites across two continents? Hundreds of linux servers? Wow. That's impressive. Too bad the small childrens' book publisher you work for in Oregon doesn't actually know anything about that. They weren't aware they had facilities in different countries, nor were they aware of these hundreds of Linux servers. Your self-proclaimed title of sys admin and security expert came as a surprise to them as well. They had no idea you were doing any of that- it certainly wasn't in your job title or duties. <p
Yes indeed, honesty is a very important thing.
As far as Linux, I can tell you from experience that most Linux admin slots usually involve a test before they'll even think of considering you for the position. My past two positions (this and a previous one) have required that I either take a written test of the company's devising, or was given a server IP address and a list of functions to perform on it (some of which are intentionally impossible to do - but the point was to know which ones, and to know when to say as much).
Oh, and who I work for? Since I only have a few days left here, I don't mind giving you a clue or two, since you're so eager to continue in your misrepresentations: My employer deals with semiconductors. Lots of them. I'm sure you might have heard of them from up there @ your job with Microsoft... rumor has it that our two employers used to work together a lot. ;) I have no idea or experience about the publishing industry, let alone children's books (hint: my name is a pretty common one - there's about 40 of me in the local phone book).
So, does that help you out any?
@Phiips:
Agreed, though most folks confuse the two all too easily. Also, money is a pitiful metric to use as far as server OS popularity, since 1) Linux can be had for $0.00, 2) It is very easy for Microsoft to over-estimate the number of licenses sold by fudging the assumptions of counts in Universal and similar licenses, and 3) Many OS products use Linux heavily in its core without saying so (see also VMWare ESX), which tends to muddy things up a bit.
When the actual server machines sold are counted, Windows Server has an even bigger lead over Linux, and incresaed their lead in 2007. For the whole of 2007, Windows server unit market share came to 66.8%, as compardd to only 23.2% for Linux.
http://www.reuters.com/article/ousiv/idUSN2748543820080228
And hey, stop telling fibs. They are getting a bit tiresome.
Your "source" is a quote from Microsoft's PR division. How about some actual third-party figures, instead of regurgitated PR from MSFT?
Also, the majority of servers sold come with no OS installed on them. If you actually worked in the enterprise, you would have known that.
/P
Maaaan... and what are all these Linux fanboys talking about then? They suck at the desktop. They never had server lead all the time either.
Answer: they can't be and it's why producing stats on commercial Linux server sales (either bought separately or pre-installed) is irrelevant because it's likely that there's far more Linux servers running that either had no OS or Windows pre-installed than servers that shipped with Linux pre-installed or had a commercial Linux installed later on.
I suspect the "true market share" of Linux (i.e. including *any* server that's running Linux) is far higher than 7.7%, but as usual, lazy CNet journos don't question the press releases they're fed and just regurgitate them verbatim.
Let's see the whole thing, please.
Now the numbers are there. Not quite the positive spin the blogger is giving, but then again, it is a blog, not a news story. I'd be curious to see a news story about this by a professional reporter.
Am I correct? Windows Server 2008 didn't launch until February 27, 2008. Hope you weren't expecting a lot of sales during the first 90 days. It takes enterprises 18-24 months to do that evaluating thing.
Peek at some of the comments between mine and this one. See what I mean in my reply to you earlier? ;)
When it comes to actual unit sales, Windows Server is far ahead of anyone else.
The last figures I have for the whole of 2007 from Gartner, have:
Windows Server unit market share : 66.8 (up 1% from 2006)
Linux Server unit market share : 23.2 (down 1% from 2006)
Unix unit market share : 6.8 (down 1.3% from 2006)
http://www.reuters.com/article/ousiv/idUSN2748543820080228
Window Server rules, and the gap actually increased during 2007.
As I said in my earlier posting, you cannot possibly know how many Linux servers are out there - quoting this "unit market share" is simply ludicrous. It comes from Gartner too, who are about as useless at being "analysts" as most of Cnet are w.r.t. their "journalism".
OK, I'll make up some 2007 figures to show how proposterous quoting Linux share of the market is:
Total Linux servers in production: 50% market share (up 12% from 2006)
Total (legal) Windows servers in production: 22% market share (down 2% from 2006)
Total (illegally installed) Windows servers in production: 12% market share (up 3% from 2006)
Other OS'es (primarily BSD and commercial UNIX): 16% market share (down 11% from 2006)
OK, anyone want to challenge those figures and quote me *exact* figures in each of those categories? Nope, didn't think so! What a joke this server market share nonsense is that's trotted every 3 months or so!
We've got a lot of Linux servers, but we're moving towards Solaris now that Sun has started getting serious about Solaris on x64. Solaris's RAS features are unmatched in the x64 realm. ZFS is incredible. It's made life so much easier for me. Right now I am working with Solaris Containers to consolidate machines and increase server utilization. It looks promising. AIX seems very competitive in RAS and has some impressive functionality in its WPARs (live VM mobility), but they want so much $ for those POWER servers that we haven't given them any serious consideration.
Being an open source guy, you should know better than to compare linux to other server os' based on revenue. This post is worthless.
-
by afaet
August 30, 2008 6:55 PM PDT
- Matt,
-
Reply to this comment
-
See all 23 Comments >>I know you a more a Linux than UNIX Guy, but that is no excuse to put the UNIX market share wrong. UNIX has a market share by revenue of 32.7% with a revenue growth of 7.7% not market share as you incorrectly wrote. There is still a lot of low-hanging UNIX fruit to eat.