RISC Servers

The big iron. This is the space that the Intel platform is trying to get into, with the Itanium and the Opteron and even faster performing P4s and Athlons. This is Unix country. Welcome to the world of the RISC server, or what we earlier used to call high-end servers.

In this category IBM, Sun and HP had a close fight, with IBM making it to the finishing line first and Sun and HP ending up at number two and three with UPIs of 96% and 92%, respectively. Though each has its zone of stronghold–IBM in the North, Sun in the South and HP in the West–each is also fairly prominent in the other zones. SGI and Unysis come in at number four and five respectively, but are far behind the three leaders.

The votes for IBM servers came from across the spend spectrum, while more votes for Sun came from those with spends above Rs one crore and for HP from those between Rs 25 lakh to Rs 50 lakh. IBM got maximum votes from the BPO and telecom, Sun from software and HP from telecom. Of the reasons given for voting for IBM and Sun, the one that figured most prominently was that they are good-quality products. The prime reason for HP was its brand name.

This category saw a high level of brand loyalty. The loyalty factor was higher for Sun and HP and only marginally lower for the winner, IBM. Of the voters who currently own IBM RISC servers, 12% say that they will shift to Sun and 6% to HP.

Interestingly, of the voters of the owners of other brands, 31% are willing to shift to Sun, 15% to IBM and a much lower 8% to HP. Opportunity for Sun?

In current ownership, too, IBM topped.

But HP came in at number two followed by Sun and then SGI. Current ownership percentage is the highest in the North and with companies with an annual IT spend of over Rs one crore. No surprises in the second part.

In the ‘plan to buy’ part, again North and companies with spends of over Rs one crore topped, percentage wise. In the verticals the pattern was the same as with current ownership.

Our survey revealed that 46% of the respondents already run RISC servers and 19% intend to buy in the coming year. Not bad growth for a category that costs big money!