HPE Server Shipments Bottom Out at 270,000 Units; AI Order Delay

Dell Server Shipments Decline for Five Consecutive Quarters, Q3

Core Overview: Five Consecutive Quarters of Shipment Declines, Significant Divergence Between Volume and Price Dell's third quarter (Q3) of 2025 recorded server shipments of 325,000 units, a slight decline of 1.5% compared to the previous quarter's 330,000 units, and a significant decrease of 9.7% compared to the same period last year (360,000 units). This marks the fifth consecutive quarter of decline since peaking in Q2 2024 (372,000 units), with the figure hitting a new low since the end of 2022. Although recent market focus has been on the high revenue generated by AI servers, the continued contraction in Dell's "shipment volume" reveals that the market structure is undergoing a drastic transformation characterized by "volume decline and price increase." Key Details: Weak Demand for General-Purpose Servers Further observation of historical data shows that the current shipment level of 325,000 units is less than 60% of the peak in 2018 (560,000 units), indicating an alarming contraction in the traditional server market. According to search result analysis, although AI server orders are full, their characteristic "high unit price, low unit count" means that in terms of quantity, they cannot fully fill the gap caused by declining demand for General Purpose Servers. Furthermore, the declining trend over five consecutive quarters has not shown signs of stabilizing, suggesting that enterprises are adopting an extremely conservative strategy regarding the replacement of non-AI infrastructure. Deep Attribution: Capital Expenditure Crowding Out and Budget Shifting Institutions such as TrendForce and IDC point out that the main reason for the decline in Dell's shipments is that Cloud Service Providers (CSPs) and enterprises have shifted most of their capital expenditure (CAPEX) toward expensive AI computing units (such as the NVIDIA Blackwell platform), leading to a severe crowding out of procurement budgets for general-purpose servers. Market analysis also suggests that although Dell has a massive backlog of AI server orders, traditional servers face the headwind of "depletion of early pull-in momentum," causing overall shipment performance to remain sluggish. Outlook and Risks: Short-term Inventory Adjustment, Long-term Low Growth Looking at the short term (1-2 months), as the traditional peak season at the end of 2025 has passed, coupled with enterprise budgets continuing to tilt toward AI, the shipment momentum for general-purpose servers is unlikely to rebound significantly, with figures likely consolidating at a low level of 320,000-330,000 units. In the medium term (3-6 months), entering 2026, the global electronics industry is expected to enter a "low-growth consolidation period." Although the penetration rate of AI servers will further increase, if the macroeconomy fails to recover significantly, the demand gap for traditional servers will continue to suppress the potential for a rebound in overall shipment volume. Web Search Reference Sources: https://vertexaisearch.cloud.google.com/grounding-api-redirect/AUZIYQHflEh4ArZEZhmWSoRJa7tr6xyqgb9i27vHc7wKTG35zjG7i8LswdaTI5aOgCRkSmQ03Vo_7esLXfMmnU7noJ6zXccQnazhDTIAMW33Bsiv2DEF704e4El8p7OSy1bbxpbO3_GVj0J6o9rohg8NZWk4_fFRHAIOh2Dd https://vertexaisearch.cloud.google.com/grounding-api-redirect/AUZIYQG6fUC9OyPn2qXscDOQiFBJu1b_Oz5kF2CcCNhy4aetL-2VNAUj5gfvlU6nQPzpoIbZ_q8UZLi2wZaz6DAY0wYk6go9JjWUq6JokWsa0_8toghV7sjm0fN4BhdadozZZj0N69PLlnE8e877Ggw0LtZ-w-SpfnMQVsHJRF8dF35IOt4_0VbDy6jHlxhqzeRY8bKk_2KrRw== https://vertexaisearch.cloud.google.com/grounding-api-redirect/AUZIYQFOdnyo1NHpNncSZkOLTNuIgFob_abrGJMFLCWHFXF5FVSPo3-NV-FxbMCr7RA4pcjgpQaiHvdTzakIuLShZaIlYi8zVKmqRPiC41p9Y-R6aoTWLTIeajmOuEA1wdGvKsXyV-2pF3Pty_TGzYhuCMT5qb2hpUwmJB69TKda3Uo6L5FG5-6eFNHirJ3PS6eIsfc2TEzzPDbrnYP4_D1uwxtrF6T9R7XJ1xAlSAa5k4Ov69TChTjn8WrwPSTgviM=