Storage Software Market and Most Sub-Markets Decline, Says IDC

Revenue Dip is First in 21 Consecutive Quarters of Growth

According to IDC's Worldwide Quarterly Storage Software Tracker, the worldwide storage software market experienced its first decline in 21 consecutive quarters of year-over-year growth in the first quarter of 2009 with revenues of $2.8 billion, representing –5.2% growth over the same quarter one year ago.

"The storage software market had its first year-over-year decline in more than five years," said Michael Margossian, research analyst, Storage Software at IDC. "The combination of the normally slow first quarter for most companies with the continued economic climate was displayed in this quarter's results. A majority of companies displayed either negative or very low year-over-year growth."

"On a yearly basis, a majority of the sub-markets declined from the previous year's first quarter. Predominantly affected were the Device Management, Replication, and Infrastructure markets, all segments closely aligned with the storage systems themselves. File System and Management software were able to grow amidst the current economic climate," added Laura DuBois , IDC's research director for Storage Software. "The overall Storage Software market was pulled down by the underperforming large companies that make up a bulk of the sub-markets, once they start to recover, they will bring the entire market up with them."

EMC led the overall market with 21.8% revenue share in the first quarter of 2009. Symantec held onto the second position with 18.9% revenue share, while IBM finished in the third position with 12.2% revenue share. NetApp finished in the fourth position with 8.3% revenue share while CA and HP rounded out the top 5 with 4.3% and 3.5% revenue share, respectively.