According to preliminary figures issued by the IDC, China accounted for 31 percent of the region's total of US$1.42 billion in the first three months.

The shipments in China amounted to 65,500 units, 40 percent of Asia Pacific's total.

"China is the reason that Asia Pacific did so well in the first quarter," Avneesh Saxena, vice-president of computing systems of IDC Asia Pacific, said in a telephone interview yesterday.

Server shipments grew by about 30 percent in the world's most populous market and revenues rose by 10 percent.

Saxena pointed out that China's growth was mainly propelled by increasing orders from government, telecom, education and energy sectors for standard Intel Architecture servers (SIASs) or so-called entry servers at a price below US$99, 999.

About one third of servers in the region were sold in China, the mainstay of the SIAS server demand in the region.

China was also the third fastest growing market in the high-end Unix servers after South Korea and India, with 25 percent growth during the quarter and 45,000 units of shipments.

However, he warned that with the outbreak of SARS in China, the demands for servers will slow down in this quarter and the next.

He explained that since a large proportion of server demands are boosted by major projects, SARS may result in the delay of some projects, while the spending in the retail, transportation, manufacturing and distribution sectors might also be muted.

"The impacts on this quarter may be moderate and slightly higher in the third quarter," said Saxena.

But he added that the situation might improve in the fourth quarter.

He is of the opinion that the government sector will be the only one to keep growing in midst of the SARS outbreak, and one which will be fiercely fought over.

(China Daily, May 21, 2001)