Below are two charts of market detail that show that 2012 and specifically the launch of Intel’s Xeon E5 Family of Processors (as will be discussed on the March 20, 2012 Peer Incite) is an inflection point in the adoption of 10Gb Ethernet. The networking impact of this launch is that it is expected that customer adoption of 10Gb Ethernet at the edge/server layer will see a steep increase; the forecast in Figure 1 supports this statement.
While 10Gb Ethernet was ratified as a standard, it took until 2007 for 10GBase-T to become a standard. While there were some 10GBase-T products shipping in the marketplace in 2011, as Figure 2 shows, it is the rollout of adapters for the new Intel Xeon E5 servers in 2012 and 2013 that will deliver 10GBase-T in greater volumes.
Action Item: Bandwidth is an enabling technology. Adoption of 10Gb Ethernet in all forms allows customers to consider new architectures of networking, increases the penetration of virtualization and can even lead to new models of application development and deployment. Customers should look to take advantage of the networking opportunities for transformation of IT while evaluating the next generation of servers.
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