Flash Storage Soars 113% YoY in EMEA- IDC

The external storage systems (ESS) market in Europe, the Middle East, and Africa (EMEA) declined 11% year over year to $1.63 billion in the second quarter of 2015, according to the IDC EMEA Quarterly Disk Storage Systems Tracker 2Q15.

While high-end storage systems fell 33% YoY in the region, flash storage systems recorded double-digit growth propelled especially by all-flash arrays (AFAs), which grew 113% YoY in user value. The total storage capacity in the region grew 2% YoY to 2.8 exabytes in the second quarter.

The ESS market value in EMEA was heavily impacted by an unfavorable exchange rate in the region, contributing to its decline for yet another quarter. In euro terms, however, the trend was positive, resulting in more than 10% growth YoY and a value of almost €1.5 billion.

The unfavorable combination of heavy currency swings, longer purchase cycles, and economic instability in the region was the main factor hindering growth in the quarter. In addition, increasing adoption of emerging technologies such as hyperconverged and software-defined storage solutions continued to further cannibalize the storage hardware market in EMEA.

"In this quarter, the disruption in the European storage market driven by the transition to the 3rd Platform has been more pronounced, with the flash segment now officially accounting for half of total EMEA sales including both AFA and HFA [hybrid flash array] systems, while AFA alone grew by 113% year on year," said Silvia Cosso, senior research analyst, European Infrastructure, at IDC. "The ODM [original design manufacturer] segment also showed a strong uptake, indicating a clear rise in public cloud adoption by European enterprises. This happened at the expense of traditional systems more geared toward the 2nd Platform such as many high-end platforms, which declined 33% year on year."