TheInfoPro (TIP), www.theinfopro.net, an independent research network and leading supplier of market intelligence for the Information Technology (IT) industry, today announced that over two-thirds of users view server virtualization – now the second highest priority among Server professionals – as critical to achieving their business objectives, with another 28% viewing it as valuable. Ninety-percent (90%) of Server professionals view virtualized servers as the next enterprise IT server platform. Further, they believe that hosting applications on their own physical servers will become the exception.

To view a rich media presentation of findings, visit: http://www.brainshark.com/theinfopro/serv-pr2

“There are many factors driving this continued shift to a virtualized server environment, but the primary motivator indicated for F1000 organizations is cost-savings, followed closely by server sprawl, and consolidation,” said Bob Gill, TIP's Managing Director of Server Research. “Though cost savings will still be considered important, by 2010, as organizations catch up with the current pace of virtualizing environments, this line of thinking will give way to other drivers being considered primary benefits, such as dynamic provisioning and disaster recovery.”

According to TIP's Wave 5 Server Study – which provides continuous market data on technologies, industry opportunities, and trends in the Server market – this relentless expansion of virtualization and growth in new applications has given way to a continuous increase in server software spending, with 50% of organizations indicating increased spending. In fact, Server pros are indicating that, in some case, over $5M is being spent on these products yearly.

Over 140 Fortune 1000 and Midsize Enterprise (MSE) end users were interviewed for the Wave 5 Server Study, providing commentary and insight on their server adoption plans, management strategies, and vendor performance. Server Technology providers that were mentioned throughout the study include: 3PAR, Acronis, Agami, AMD, APC, Aperture Technologies, Blade Networks, Cisco, CommVault, Compellent, Data Domain, Dell, Determina, Egenera, EMC, Fujitsu, Fujitsu Siemens, HP, IBM, Intel, LSI Logic, Microsoft, mValent, NetApp, Novell, OPNET, Opsware, PlateSpin, Red Hat, Riverbed, Scalent, ScriptLogic, Seagate, Sentillion, Sun, Trapeze, VMware, and XenSource.