According to Gartner, worldwide external controller-based (ECB) disk storage revenue totaled $15.2 billion in 2006, a 4.1% increase over 2005 revenue of $14.6 billion, with India posting the fastest growth.

EMC maintained the No. 1 spot worldwide in 2006, as its market share grew to 24.8%. IBM overtook Hewlett-Packard for the second position in 2006 with IBM’s worldwide ECB market share growing to 15.8%, while HP’s market share dropped to 13.1%. Hitachi/HDS maintained the No. 4 position with a market share of 9.5%. Dell and Network Appliance were No. 5 and 6 with 7.6% and 7.2% of the market, respectively.

APEJ (Asia Pacific excluding Japan) that accounts for 10.3% of global revenues grew 9.3% in 2006 to total $1.56 billion. China and Australia accounted for nearly 50% of overall revenues for ECB storage in the region. The ECB storage market in India grew close to 23%, totalling $ 152.01 million to account for 9.7% of overall revenues, emerging as the fourth largest market in APEJ region.

IBM surpassed EMC to occupy the number 1 position in 2006, with revenue of $361.3 million to account for 23% of overall APEJ revenues.

IBM overtook EMC to lead the Indian ECB market in 2006. It was also the fastest growing vendor in the Indian external storage market and registered a revenue growth of almost 59% on a year on year basis.

"In 2006, India continued to hold on to its forte of being one of the fastest growing storage markets in the world in terms of units, value and in terabytes. Global storage vendors have made significant investments in the Indian market and many vendors have set up their global R&D initiatives in India. The market in itself has started witnessing wider acceptance as vendors are no longer confined to a few select verticals to usher in business," noted Aman Munglani, principal analyst with Gartner’s global storage practice.

ECB disk storage revenue in India totaled $44.7 million in the last quarter of calendar year 2006, a 32.7% increase over the same period in 2005. As a result, India emerged to be the fastest growing storage market in the APEJ region.