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Cloud infrastructure spend to crack $90b and overtake non-cloud in 2022

Buyers other than cloud operators remain the dominant source of dollars

Simon Sharwood, APAC Editor Mon 4 Jul 2022 // 04:29 UTC

Analyst outfit IDC has predicted that the world's IT buyers will spend more on infrastructure intended for use in clouds than in other scenarios some time during 2022.
The firm's latest Worldwide Quarterly Enterprise Infrastructure Tracker: Buyer and Cloud Deployment, found that spending on compute and storage infrastructure products for cloud deployments jumped 17.2 percent year over year in the first quarter of 2022 (1Q22) to $18.3 billion.
To understand the rest of the analyst's forecasts, know that IDC uses the following definitions for clouds:

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PC shipments sink amid steady waves of supply chain, war disruptions

320 million units forecast, still well above pre-pandemic, but boom is over for now

Paul Kunert Thu 9 Jun 2022 // 14:30 UTC

Orders for PCs are forecast to shrink in 2022 as consumers confront rising inflation, the war in Ukraine, and lockdowns in parts of the world critical to the supply chain, all of which continue.
So says IDC, which forecast shipments to decline 8.2 percent year-on-year to 321.2 million units during this calendar year. This follows three straight years of growth, the last of which saw units shipped rise to 348.8 million.
Things might be taking a turn for the worse but they are far from disastrous for an industry revived by the pandemic when PCs became the center of many people's universe. Shipments are still forecast to come in well above the pre-pandemic norms; 267 million units were shipped in 2019.

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PC sales start to ebb as pandemic buying spree ends: IDC

Analyst says it's not a 'downward spiral' as sales are still defying predictions

Laura Dobberstein Mon 11 Apr 2022 // 05:45 UTC

Shipments of PCs have finally slowed down after two years of double-digit growth, declining worldwide by 5.1 per cent year-on-year in Q1 2022, market research firm International Data Corp (IDC) said on Monday.
While the decline reflects both rising costs and market saturation in some segments, IDC reassured it in no way represents a "downward spiral." For one, even though notebook PCs declined, desktops grew slightly. For another, the numbers exceeded earlier forecasts.
Vendors still shipped over 80 million desktops, notebooks and workstations during the quarter – and did so for a seventh consecutive quarter. Such a feat hasn't happened since 2012.

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IDC: Public clouds to surpass non-cloud spending this year

So long as the economy stays healthy, and supply can catch up to demand

Dan Robinson Fri 1 Apr 2022 // 13:00 UTC

IDC forecasts that spending on compute and storage systems for cloud infrastructure will grow 21.7 percent this year compared to 2021. Spending on public clouds is also expected to pass that of non-cloud infrastructure in 2022.
The research firm made the predictions as part of its latest Worldwide Quarterly Enterprise Infrastructure Tracker: Buyer and Cloud Deployment report, which follows the proportion of compute and storage hardware products that are being sold into cloud environments.
IDC found that in 4Q21, total spending on cloud infrastructure increased 13.5 percent to $21.1 billion compared with the same quarter in 2020. This was the second consecutive quarter of year-on-year growth, with IDC noting that the ongoing supply chain constraints have depleted vendor inventories over the past several quarters, which means that pent-up demand will likely lead to more growth in future, so long as the supply chain can keep up.

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APAC region's PC market growth flattens out

COVID saw sales surge, but there's less reason to buy in the new normal

Laura Dobberstein Fri 25 Mar 2022 // 01:01 UTC

The APAC region's market for traditional PCs - desktops notebooks and workstations - grew 15.9 per cent year-on-year in 2021 to 120.3 million units, but shipments appear to have peaked according to analyst firm IDC.
Notebooks topped 2021's sales charts, growing 17.5 per cent year-on-year to 77.3 million shipments while desktops grew by 11.8 per cent to 41 million.
"The Asia Pacific region benefited from significantly improved supply in the second half of 2021," said IDC analyst Matthew Ong. "With slowing demand in mature economies like the United States, PC vendors began to prioritize countries in Asia/Pacific, which led to much-needed backlog order fulfillments and inventory replenishments."

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US biz to blow $120bn on AI by 2025, says IDC

Get ready for machine-made decisions, whether you're shopping, banking, reading, working

Katyanna Quach Thu 17 Mar 2022 // 21:45 UTC

Corporate funding splurged on AI technology is expected to grow to $120bn by 2025 in the US, a yearly increase of 26 percent over the next four financial years, according to IDC.
The two largest industries ramping up investments in machine learning are retail and banking, according to the market research firm. Together they are predicted to make up 28 percent, nearly $20bn, of investments by 2025. The fastest rate of spending increase, however, will come from media and financial trading businesses. AI investments for these markets are projected to grow 30 percent year over year. Automated claims processing and IT optimization will be growth areas, increasing 30 and 29.7 percent respectively every year until 2025.
"The greatest potential benefit for the use of AI remains its use in developing new business, and building new business models," Mike Glennon, senior research manager with IDC's Customer Insights & Analysis team said.

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Despite shortages, networking hardware market grew strongly in 2021

Any port in a storm

Laura Dobberstein Mon 14 Mar 2022 // 07:45 UTC

Analyst firm International Data Corporation (IDC) has found that the global market for switches surged during 2021, despite shortages that have seen delivery of some products delayed for many months.
Worldwide ethernet switch revenues grew at 11.8 percent year-on-year to US$8.5B in Q4 2021 while router market revenues grew at seven percent year-on-year to US$4.6B. From an annual perspective, the Ethernet switch market experienced a 9.7 percent increase to deliver sales of US$30.7B for 2021 and the router market experienced a 6.5 percent increase to US$15.9B.
Overall switch port shipments increased 13.0 per cent in 4Q21 and rose 16.2 per cent on an annualized basis in 2021, suggesting increased revenue correlated to more devices and capacity shipping rather than vendors getting away with price hikes during shortages.

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Russian conflict unlikely to harm global ICT spending, yet

But uncertainty, supply, power woes could cause trouble ahead

Nicole Hemsoth Mon 7 Mar 2022 // 21:20 UTC

Even without Russia's small drums, the tech investment beat goes on
The tech market has plenty of problems to contend with in 2022 and beyond but demand is not currently one of them. What is complicating prognostications for the wider global ICT market, along with the known quantities (inflation, supply chain bottlenecks, etc.) is the Russian-Ukrainian conflict.
With no market potential left in Ukraine for the near term and a rapidly dwindling list of tech companies to deploy in Russia, it might be tempting to think the ripple effect of those losses will be large. But some perspective is needed, especially as we watch Russia scrambling to cobble together parts for future systems, not to mention rush to find adequate replacements for enterprise software and support packages.

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India surpasses a billion active mobile subscriptions

Also has more than 100 million 2G subscribers, and a tiny PC market

Simon Sharwood, APAC Editor Fri 25 Feb 2022 // 05:44 UTC

One billion Indian wireless services subscribers were active in December 2021 – the first time the nation has breached the nine-figure barrier. But that colossal number betrays a market that is still far from saturated by smartphones or ready for rich digital services.
News that the nation topped the billion mark emerged in data [PDF] released last week by the nation's Telecom Regulatory Authority, which revealed that on a single day in December last year 1,000,630,000 subscribers were active. The regulator counted 1.155 billion mobile subscriptions in the same month.
By way of contrast, China's big three carriers already boast more than 750 million 5G subscriptions and over one billion 4G accounts. India still has tens of millions of people on 2G networks, and its carriers are yet to operate a 5G network.

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Do you trust your provider farther than you can throw them? Cloud priorities shifting in post-COVID world – IDC

Companies focus on 'broader' ecosystem

Dan Robinson Mon 7 Feb 2022 // 12:59 UTC

Organisations are shifting their priorities in cloud procurement as they look beyond the COVID-19 pandemic, with "trust" now apparently the biggest issue.
These trends were identified in IDC's Q3 2021 BuyerView Cloud Pulse survey, released today, which found that almost 70 per cent of more than 1,300 respondents indicated they expect to return to pre-pandemic levels for business operations and functions within a year.
But as well as looking to more flexible delivery models, contracts and solutions from their cloud service providers, the survey respondents said the leading attribute they are now looking for in a cloud platform is "trust".

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