Top 5 Best-Selling All-Flash Storage Market Leaders In Q1 2019

Here are the five best-selling all-flash storage brands in the first quarter of 2019 sold through the channel.

The All-Flash Leaders

Dell EMC and NetApp sold the most all-flash storage arrays through the channel in North America during the first quarter of 2019, according to data from The NPD Group.

Total channel sales from all-flash storage arrays reached $229 million in the quarter, up 2.6 percent year over year, according to Port Washington, N.Y.-based NPD Group, which tracks monthly technology sales-out information from the largest distributors and resellers in North America.

Dell EMC, Hewlett Packard Enterprise, Pure Storage, NetApp and NetApp’s SolidFire division accumulated for approximately 82 percent of the total all-flash market sold through the channel in North America, according to NPD. The all-flash array market has been steadily increasing on a global basis as well. The worldwide all-flash market generated $2.73 billion in total revenue during the fourth quarter of 2018, up nearly 38 percent year over year, according to market research firm IDC.

CRN breaks down the five best-selling all-flash storage brands for the first quarter of 2019, which spanned from January to March, based on data from the NPD Group.

Dell EMC

Dollar Share: 37.5%

Dell EMC took the gold with $86 million in all-flash sales during the quarter, representing 37.5 percent of the total market revenue. However, the $86 million was a 20 percent sales drop compared to the $99 million in all-flash revenue Dell EMC generated in the first quarter of 2018. Dell’s total dollar share dropped from 48.1 percent to 37.5 percent year over year.

Dell EMC, which is part of Round Rock, Texas-based Dell Technologies, accounted for nine out of the top ten best-selling all-flash models during the quarter. The top selling storage product of the quarter was Dell EMC’s PowerMax 2000 model EH-CAPX. Other of the hottest selling storage products that made the top ten list include Dell EMC models for the VMAX 950X, VMAX 950F and PowerMax 8000.

Dell EMC recently boosted its storage portfolio that included major enhancements to its midrange Unity, flagship PowerMax and unstructured data Isilon lines as well as new Cloud Storage Services.

SolidFire

Dollar Share: 22.4%

SolidFire, a business division of NetApp that specializes in all-flash storage, was the runner-up by capturing $51.4 million in sales during the first quarter, representing 22.4 percent dollar share. SolidFire share rose from 3.7 percent to 22.4 percent year-over-year; however, that comes as NetApp’s dollar share decreased dramatically in the same time. NetApp touts SolidFire as the industry’s most complete all-flash storage system for growing cloud infrastructure.

The 1.92TB SolidFire SF-Series 19210 was the second-most sold all-flash product during the quarter, according to the NPD Group. The SF-Series 19210 delivers the full SolidFire feature set, including guaranteed Quality of Service (QoS), a scale-out architecture, in-line data reduction, complete system automation and integration with VMware and OpenStack. The SF-Series is suited for heavily virtualized environments, databases, and public and private cloud infrastructures where guaranteed performance, scale-out capacity, and higher infrastructure density are required.

Pure Storage

Dollar Share: 10.2%

The all-flash storage specialist generated $23.4 million in sales during the quarter, up nearly 28 percent year-over-year, to win third place. Mountain View, Calif.-based Pure Storage captured 10.2 percent dollar share of the North American market, up from the 8.2 percent share it won during the first quarter 2018.

Pure share prices plummeted 24 percent this week, after posting first fiscal quarter 2020 earnings that fell short of investor expectations. Pure reported revenue of $326.7 million, up 28 percent year over year. However, that missed analyst expectations of about $333 million. Charles Giancarlo, Pure’s chairman and CEO, said although revenue was below expectations, the company’s fundamentals are still strong. “We are broadening our customer base,” he said. “We are delivering new innovations through both organic and inorganic investments.”

In April, Pure unveiled its acquisition of Swedish firm Compuverde in a move to boost its file capabilities and help customers create hybrid architectures.

NetApp

Dollar Share: 8.7%

NetApp, which owns SolidFire, placed fourth in all-flash sales during the first quarter with approximately $20 million in revenue, down 62 percent year over year. NetApp’s dollar share dropped from 23.4 percent in first quarter 2018 to 8.7 percent.

The Sunnyvale, Calif.-based company grew net revenues to $6.15 billion for its fiscal year 2019, which ended April 26, 2019, up 4 percent year-on-year. NetApp has been a leader in the charge toward a cloud-first approach to storage and is currently considering launching a consumption-based data management offering.

The company recently introduced the latest in its all-flash storage systems, the AFF A320, which offers end-to-end NVMe performance. The A320 is a 2U array with 100-Gbit Ethernet ports and support for NVMe SSDs. On the channel front, NetApp this month made significant changes to its channel program by simplifying rebates and ensuring all types of partners can be profitable.

Hewlett Packard Enterprise

Dollar Share: 3.5%

The $31 billion infrastructure giant generated $8.1 million in all-flash sales, up an astounding 162 percent compared to the $2.9 million in revenue from first quarter 2018. The sales spike helped HPE’s dollar share increased from 1.4 percent to 3.5 percent year over year.

The San Jose, Calif.-based company is the third largest external enterprise storage vendor in the world with 10.6 percent global market share by capturing approximately $813 million in the fourth quarter of 2018, according to IDC. In late 2018, HPE launched a new 550 employee unit dedicated to its North America storage business. HPE added new sales muscle to drive the new storage business including increasing the number of inside sales reps from 20 to 100 with new account lead generation for working with channel partners.

In May, HPE unveiled its intent to acquire artificial intelligence and supercomputer innovator Cray for $1.3 billion. The two companies plan to create a variety of new joint solutions including around high-performance storage.