Abstract
This IDC study provides IDCs 2005 worldwide market analysis and forecast for a critical
component in the market for network storage solutions, Fibre Channel (FC) switches. It forecasts
port shipments as well as factory and market revenues for the sale of FC switches in four segments:
chassis switches, 16- to 48-port fixed-port switches, entry-level switches, and blade
server-embedded switches.
This study discusses how future trends in volume and blade server shipments, the deployment of
storage in small and medium-sized businesses, and competing technologies such as iSCSI will affect
the competitive position of FC switch vendors. It also provides specific advice to these companies
on how to best take advantage of the changing world of networked storage.
"The next two years have the potential to be a time of solid revenue growth for FC switch
suppliers as more companies move toward SAN-based storage architectures and begin to exploit bladed
server architectures," said Richard Villars, vice president, Storage Systems, at IDC.
"Much of that growth opportunity is at risk, however, if the FC community as a whole doesnt
make significant headway in connecting the growing base of volume servers running Windows and
Linux." | 
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