IBM’s Storage Systems Division says that it has shipped the 1,000th of its Shark Enterprise Storage Servers since introducing the product in July (CI No 3,711). The Sharks, which actually started shipping in volume in September, represent IBM’s attempt to wrest control of the mainframe and open systems disk markets back from industry juggernaut EMC Corp. EMC has about 35% of the enterprise market (by revenue) compared to IBM’s 22%. Analysts have told us that IBM could grab up to $700m business with Shark this year, and it looks as though IBM may have broken through that level already depending on the Shark configurations it has sold. A fully loaded Shark with 11Tb of disk and lots of software functionality weighs in at a hefty $3m.
