According to IDC's Worldwide Quarterly Server Tracker, factory revenue in the worldwide server market grew 5.1% to $14.4 billion in the fourth quarter of 2004, marking the seventh consecutive quarter of positive growth.

Worldwide server unit shipments growth slowed modestly to 15.7% in 4Q04 when compared with the year-ago period.

For the full year 2004, worldwide server revenue grew 6.2% to $49.0 billion, while worldwide unit shipments grew 19.3% to 6.3 million units. IBM led the overall server market in 2004 with 33.3% revenue share, followed by HP with 26.6% share.

The volume server segment (servers priced less than $25,000) was the only market segment that experienced revenue growth in 4Q04, while midrange enterprise servers ($25,000 to $499,999) and high-end enterprise servers ($500,000 or more) showed declining revenue.

"Volume servers are being deployed in rich configurations, and in scale-out cluster configurations, to take on a wider range of enterprise workloads," said Matthew Eastwood, program vice president of IDC's Worldwide Server Group.

This week was MCI (www.mci.com) and Cisco Systems, Inc., (www.cisco.com) announced that the two companies will collaborate. The partnership will enable Cisco channel partners to address the diverse needs of today's small and medium-sized business (SMB) customers by selling IP-based next generation services.

"IP-based services are becoming ever more essential to businesses of all sizes," said Phil Meeks, senior vice president of MCI Strategic Ventures and Alliances.

Another hosting provider, Equinix, Inc. expanded agreement with Ticketmaster, whereby the ticketing company will utilize Equinix's Chicago Internet Business Exchange™ (IBX®) center to host additional operations.

The expansion http://www.hostreview.com/news/news/050223Equinix.html will enable Ticketmaster to operate within a centralized hub near a critical mass of network service providers and other companies operating within the IBX.

Among the news about the new launches can be distinguished The PlanetSM addition of Internet Security Systems, Inc.'s, (ISS) RealSecure® Server Sensor to its product lineup.

The host-based, automated intrusion detection system monitors activity across computer systems and networks in real-time, allowing instant response to security breaches.

"We want our customers to be covered in more than one way at every level," explained Ryan Carter, Information Security Manager for The Planet.

The deal of the web hosting industry week was announced by AT&T. The company was awarded a three-year, $2 million global networking contract by Tuthill Corp., a leading industrial equipment manufacturer. With this contract, AT&T wins all of Tuthill's data services from MCI and becomes the company's primary networking services provider.

Netcraft report this week announced Internet marketing firm Marchex Inc. has finalized a deal to pay a whopping $164.2 million for Name Development Ltd., which displays keyword advertising across a portfolio of more than 100,000 domains.

The deal, along with the recent sale of a misspelled domain name for $112,000, offers evidence that mistyped URLs and other "accidental traffic" have become big business, commented the monitoring authority.

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