So, I guess, the Itanium server chip is not dead after all. Well... actually HP is probably "the" sole reason why Intel has not shelved the moribund processor. The server company is slowly transitioning all its enterprise customers using old PA-RISC/MIPS/Alpha systems to its Itanium based Integrity platform.

According to IDC, HP accounted for 70% of the total Itanium market in 2005, i.e $2.2 billion, which rose in 2006 at nearly 82% maket share of the total available market of $3.2 billion. This year the analyst firm expects the market to reach $4.2 billion and $6.8 billion by 2011.

We are probably happier now with our decision to go to that architecture instead of MIPS, PA-RISC and Alpha, that we have ever been largely based on the performance of the product and our ISV adoption. We also have the most performing product around the TPC-C environment right now but what matters to customers is our ability to build systems that achieve the adaptive infrastructure the question about Itanium is long behind us.