SSD Sales At $1.3 Billion – Revenue Up 91% For Q3 ’11 Alone

According to the technology market research firm IDC, SSD shipments saw a huge jump of nearly 67% in the 3rd quarter of 2011 as compared to the same period in 2010.

Revenue on those sales was up 91.6% to nearly $1.29 billion over that same period. This is coming on top of an already record year for the worldwide SSD market, when revenue more than doubled compared to 2009. Undoubtedly, recent flooding and subsequent hard drive shortages have played a significant role in this.

Much of that growth comes in the enterprise and client (consumer) segments and  IDC separates their research into three categories; commercial, enterprise, and client.  The commercial segment is comprised of medical equipment, factory automation, aerospace, and military systems.  Enterprise, of course, refers to data center storage arrays and servers.  Their client segment is the PC market; which also includes notebooks and netbooks.

Commercial segment sales actually dipped over the past year by some 15% to $59.7 million.  Enterprise revenues were up 110% to $522 million.  The biggest increase is seen in the client (consumer) markets, with an increase from $354 million to over $716 million in sales.

Jeff Janukowicz, Solid State Storage Technologies research manager at IDC, states “2010 was a record year for the worldwide SSD market, with revenue increasing 103.4% year over year due to strong SSD growth in the enterprise segment and the client segment.  Yet, the SSD market is still in an early stage of its business life cycle and is beginning to reach mainstream markets.”

He goes on to say “Looking forward, we see a multitude of market dynamics thrusting the SSD market and industry participants into the next life-cycle stage — growth.  As a result, IDC expects the market to continue to evolve, and the outlook for the SSD market is positive.”

The current shortage situation of HDD’s will throw additional fuel on this growth — 2012 could see SSD sales on fire!