Storage software market up again in Q3, IDC says

Demand for storage software products continues to grow, with revenue up 10 per cent in the third quarter, marking eight consecutive quarters of double-digit year-over-year growth, according to data published by IDC in its Worldwide Quarterly Storage Tracker.

Revenue grew to $US2.1 billion in the third quarter of 2005. The market for storage replication software posted the largest gain over the previous year earlier -16.8 per cent. The back-up and archive market also showed strong demand, with revenue up 12.7 per cent.

Products for storage resource management, along with back-up and archiving software, remained the storage software industry's largest segments. Each accounted for a third of the total, IDC said.

EMC led the industry with revenue of $621 million, or 29.1 per cent of the market. Symantec (20 per cent) was second, following its acquisition of Veritas, IBM (9.4) came third with revenue of US$201 million. Network Appliance (6.9 per cent) landed in fourth position, slightly ahead of HP (6.7 per cent).

Of the top five vendors, Network Appliance posted the strongest year-over-year growth in the third quarter, at 42.5 per cent.

IDC's figures track new license and maintenance revenue.