The three major trends in the server market

The x86 server market moved eastward mainly due to the large number of consumer groups in China and the rising Chinese server manufacturers. Inspired by the wave of “going to IOE” and the realization of an autonomous and controllable historical mission, Chinese server manufacturers have achieved a breakthrough in the x86 server market. This is reflected not only by server vendors such as Huawei, Inspur and Lenovo. Market share has risen sharply and ranks among the top in the global market. In terms of server system technology innovation and application innovation, local companies have also come out of their own characteristics.

The Internet market can be

When Huawei entered the enterprise market, its server products were the breakthrough points opened by the Internet industry, and then extended to other industries. Usually, some large Internet companies purchase tens of thousands of servers per server. Therefore, the Internet industry has also become a strong support for Chinese server manufacturers to rapidly increase their shipments and market share in the short term.

IDC statistics show that this year, the server procurement volume of Internet-related industries has accounted for about 40% of China's overall market for x86 servers, and for the first time exceeded the number of government industries. Because cloud computing and big data are surging, large-scale data centers are flourishing everywhere. If Chinese manufacturers can seize this opportunity, they may be able to stand out in the new competition.

However, the server procurement of users in the Internet industry is also a double-edged sword: On the one hand, it has a large amount of purchases, which makes the Internet industry a must for server manufacturers; on the other hand, the Internet industry users have high demand for customized services. Purchasing usually takes the initiative and the profitability of products is very low. In the competition with ODM, the advantages of branded server manufacturers are becoming less obvious.

In order to better meet the customization needs of Internet companies, branded server vendors have also begun to actively participate in the R&D and delivery of server racks. The well-known Tianyi full-rack server technical specification 2.0 has recently become the industry standard. Compared with the past using a single server as the computing granule, the entire cabinet server now uses the cabinet as the computing granule, achieving overall and rapid delivery. In addition, the overall rack server deployment density and efficiency are significantly increased compared to traditional servers, while power consumption and total cost of ownership are significantly reduced. In the future, the form of the server may be further differentiated: one direction is the further separation of computing and storage; the other is the closer separation of computing and storage, and closer integration and integration.

Occupy high-end

For Chinese server manufacturers, such as 1st and 2nd-tier servers are important, but to reflect their technical capabilities and achieve differentiated competition, it seems more attractive to occupy a place in the high-end server market of more than 8 lines. force.

Huawei has clearly stated that it is necessary to focus on building high-end servers. 16 or even 32 servers are planned. Inspur debuted the minicomputer Tissot K1 910 on September 23 this year, mainly in order to meet the original product's full coverage of the key business market, and has already opened up a rack-and-stack approach that rivals foreign companies in the minicomputer market.

In the past two years, in the domestic market, the trend of “going to IOE” has intensified. Replacing traditional closed systems with open x86 servers is only one aspect. More importantly, the Chinese government and enterprises have a deeper understanding of “security and control”. More intense pursuit. Not long ago, the China Banking Regulatory Commission (CBRC) stated on its official website “Guidance on the application of safe and controllable information technology to strengthen the banking network security and information construction” mentioned that by 2019, security and controllable information technology should be achieved in the banking industry as a whole. About 75% usage rate. The autonomous and controllable implementation of IT products, especially the autonomous and controllable data center infrastructure such as servers and storage, is of far-reaching significance in enhancing the information security level of enterprises and countries and promoting the development of national IT industry. Inspur has clearly stated that it hopes to gain more market share in key industries in countries with strong demand for security and control.

However, security and control cannot be the umbrella of domestic server manufacturers. With equal competition with foreign manufacturers, domestic server manufacturers still have to rely on their own technical strength, innovation ability and strength to serve customers.

Software definition is business-driven

"Software Definition" is gradually penetrating into the server domain. After Intel released the latest generation of Xeon E5 v3 processor, almost all mainstream server vendors immediately launched a new generation of server products using this processor. Huawei, Sugon and other vendors have kneaded the concept of "software definition" into their own. Server products.

Huawei's SDI (Software Driven Infrastructure) is actually a concrete embodiment of the concept of "software definition". It represents a streamlined, efficient, and easy-to-use innovation. On the server side, Huawei SDI also has a very specific plan for landing.

The core of software definition is actually business-driven. In the future, whoever can better grasp and meet customer needs will be able to lead the market.