McData Munches Market Share

McData Corp. (Nasdaq: MCDTA) was the only major SAN switch vendor to increase its share in the second quarter of 2003 -- increasing its piece of the Fibre Channel switch market to 33 percent -- according to research firm Dell'Oro Group (see McData Ups FC Switch Share).

Brocade Communications Systems Inc. (Nasdaq: BRCD) held on to its No. 1 spot in the overall Fibre Channel switch market.

But in the key FC fabric switch segment -- where Brocade has historically been the strongest -- the company showed only 18 percent sequential growth for the second quarter, while the overall industry grew at a 25 percent quarterly rate, to an estimated 290,400 ports shipped, according to Dell'Oro (see Dell'Oro: FC Ports Up 14% in Q2).

By contrast, Dell'Oro says, McData boosted its share in the "fixed switch" segment (more commonly referred to as fabric switches) from the first to the second quarter of 2003 from 16.3 percent to 20.7 percent. McData says it has more than quadrupled its market share in the category since the first quarter of 2002.

"We've received a tremendous response to the introduction of our Sphereon 4500 fabric switch and expect to penetrate further into that market with the recent launch of the Sphereon 4300," said Mike Gustafson, McData's senior VP of worldwide marketing, in a statement.QLogic Corp. (Nasdaq: QLGC), which holds the No. 3 spot in the fabric switch segment, increased its port shipments 5 percent in the second quarter, according to Dell'Oro. Cisco Systems Inc. (Nasdaq: CSCO), which just started shipping its FC switches in the second quarter, comes in fourth (see FC Market Gets Rattled). The research firm discloses vendor rankings and quarterly growth, but not market share figures.

McData first introduced the Sphereon 4500, which provides 8, 16, or 24 ports, one year ago with a strategy explicitly designed to undercut Brocade (see McData Lowers Boom on Brocade). It launched the 4300, which provides between four and 12 ports, in August (see McData Swings Switches Lower).

Analysts have praised the architecture of the Sphereon family of switches as providing a low-cost, single-ASIC design that allows McData to compete very aggressively on price-per-port (see McData Picks Brocade's Pocket).

In addition to delivering a competitive FC fabric switch, McData has greatly improved its ability to meet the needs of resellers, says Jeff Brandes, VP and GM of distribution operations for storage and security software distributor Network Engines Inc. based in Canton, Mass.

"McData has steadily, over the past two years, recognized the importance of the channel," he says. "The switch vendors have a large OEM component, and balancing that has been hard. McData's been good at managing it."Todd Spangler, US Editor, Byte and Switch