Global server shipments are forecast to increase 5-6% in 2020 after falling slightly in 2019, as brand vendors are expected to renew shipments pull-in momentum having adjusted their inventories to healthy levels, according to Digitimes Research.
Taiwan-based suppliers of server-related products, including motherboards, server cabinets, storage devices and network equipment, will see their combined revenues rise 2.3% on year to NT$887 billion (US$29.41 billion), compared to a 2.5% decline in total server unit shipments. This is due partly to increased shipment ratios for storage and networking devices and overall performance upgrades of their products.
Digitimes Research expects the combined revenues of Taiwanese suppliers to rise 6-7% on year in 2020, still slightly higher than an estimated on-year expansion of 5-6% for both their and global server unit shipments.
In 2019, server shipments to leading US datacenter operators including Facebook and Amazon have shown the most notable growth. Lenovo and Inspur have also registered impressive increases thanks to the US ban on Huawei. In 2020, major shipments pull-in momentum will continue to come from top US datacenter operators.
In terms of server shipments in 2019, Inventec and Foxconn remain Taiwan's top-2 suppliers, and Quanta takes the third place, elbowing out Wistron. In 2020, Quanta is expected to advance to second place, Digitimes Research indicates.