IDC Reports Solid Disk Growth

FRAMINGHAM, Mass. -- Worldwide external disk storage systems factory revenues posted 10.8% year-over-year growth in the first quarter of 2008 (1Q08) and totaling $4.9 billion, according to the IDC Worldwide Disk Storage Systems Quarterly Tracker. For the quarter, the total disk storage systems market grew to $6.7 billion in revenues, up 8.4% from the prior year's first quarter. Total disk storage systems capacity shipped reached 1,642 petabytes, growing 51.8% year over year.

"After a very healthy 2007, the disk storage systems market is carrying that momentum into 2008, with most product segments seeing solid growth in the first quarter," said Brad Nisbet, research manager, IDC. "It's clear that while organizations may be feeling squeezed in their overall IT budgets, the investments being made to store growing volumes of critical business data adequately are increasing. We see a long road of positive drivers fueling the opportunities for disk storage systems in the form of increased retention requirements and long-term data protection goals."

IDC