Hi Christopher,
What do you think, as an expert, about the future of Brocade and McData? Which manufacturer will be ahead? What about the stocks, do you think that the SAN market will improve by the end of this year or the beginning of next year? Thank you,Andreas
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Hmmmm....if I had a crystal ball and could predict that kind of information, I would be on a yacht in the Caribbean and not answering questions on this Web site...
The SAN market is doing fine today. The stocks are down, but companies still need to buy massive amounts of storage. Companies have tried to slow down a bit on their purchases, but the fact is that implementing a SAN actually can SAVE money in both the short and long term. This fact is forcing companies to take a serious look at implementing today.
IDC and Gartner have put out numbers for future growth in this area, and they are staggering! Storage will be the main IT budget expense going forward, even exceeding server purchases. So what does that mean for the switch vendors? I think there will be consolidation moving forward, but the two companies you mentioned will do well. There is plenty to go around, and as long as the switch vendors provide SAN management integration for frameworks with their products, they will do well.
Chris
This was first published in August 2001