WEB AND APPLICATION HOSTING Summer 2013 KEY FINDINGS Although the Internet infrastructure services business continues to grow in every segment, that growth is slowing in some of the traditional infrastructure markets as workloads continue to move to environments that are more suitable for their particular requirements (cost, SLA, geography, etc.), including utility-billed public cloud infrastructure, managed hosting and pure SaaS environments all markets seeing substantially higher growth rates. We call this best execution venue strategies. Cloud infrastructure continues to be an aspirational line of business for traditional players in the Internet infrastructure space. However, the true, utility-billed public infrastructure-as-a-service (IaaS) offering is not necessarily the standard. Many traditional hosting players are applying emerging cloud technology to existing hosting models, and going to market with fixed-cost, monthly billed cloud server products. The notion of Web presence is evolving for SMBs and micro-businesses to include mobile and social media components, creating new requirements and opening the door to new lines of business for service providers focused on Web hosting. SEPTEMBER 2013
REPORT SNAPSHOT TITLE Web and Application Hosting Summer 2013 ANALYST Liam Eagle, Internet Infrastructure Services RELEASE DATE September 2013 LENGTH 45 pages ABOUT THIS REPORT The Web and application infrastructure hosting market (which 451 Research formerly referred to as mass-market hosting ) is transitioning to slower growth as workloads move from traditional shared and dedicated hosting environments into new execution venues in the cloud and managed infrastructure spaces. New customer growth is coming in new areas of the market, driven by new types of products. The ability to drive user volume has been joined by the ability to drive additional per-user revenue through new services and bundling strategies as key measures of success. 451 Research now uses the term Web and application hosting to make it more explicit what we consider a part of this sector. The market includes shared, dedicated and virtual private server (VPS) infrastructure services, as well as hosted application services, domains and other products and services. This report focuses on Web and application hosting, to the exclusion of some other kinds of IT infrastructure. The lines between those sectors are blurring, especially as Web hosting providers begin offering more cloud-like infrastructure and managed-like services. We produce separate research on the managed hosting, CDN and multi-tenant datacenter (MTDC) markets, however. This report analyzes key market conditions and trends influencing the Web and application hosting sector worldwide. It evaluates the current market from a strategic perspective and identifies current and long-term trends and opportunities, including specific examples of how hosting providers are reacting to these trends. It delivers market data through 2016, profiles major players by share of revenue and strategy, and identifies innovative technologies and businesses that have the potential for disruptive impact.
COMPANIES INCLUDED IN THIS REPORT 1&1 Internet Apptix Arsys Aruba Group Belgacom BetterLinux Blacknight Solutions BlogDroid BurstNET Technologies CentriLogic Champion Solutions Group Choopa.com Cinven Claranet CloudFlare CloudLinux Cogeco Corporation Service Company cpanel Dada Group (Dada SpA) Demand Media Deutsche Telekom Directi DreamHost Earthlink Easyspace EasyStreet Endurance International Group enom Fasthosts Gandi.net GMO Internet GoGrid Hetzner Hivelocity Host Europe Group Host.net HostDime.com HOSTING Hostopia Hostpoint Hostway HybridCluster IBM Infinity Internet intergenia Intermedia internet24 iomart Group iweb Technologies KPN Layered Tech Leaseweb Liquid Web Locaweb M.dot M247 Media Temple Melbourne IT Mojoness Name.com NetNames Novacap NTT OnApp Open-Xchange OVH OzHosting Pagely PEER 1 Hosting Rackspace ReadySpace Seaport Capital Seeweb ServePath ServInt SingleHop SoftLayer Strato Telanetix Tenzing Managed IT Services The Go Daddy Group Tucows Tumblr UK2 Group UKFast United Internet Verio Verisign VerticalResponse Web.com Group WebsPlanet Webvisions WEBZILLA Weebly WiredTree Yahoo Yola WEB AND APPLICATION HOSTING SUMMER 2013
TABLE OF CONTENTS INTRODUCTION 1 EXECUTIVE SUMMARY...................... 1 KEY FINDINGS......................... 2 METHODOLOGY......................... 3 Figure 1: Aggregate View of Hosting Services Provided......... 3 MARKET OVERVIEW 4 SECTOR BACKGROUND...................... 4 TRADITIONAL MARKET FORCES................... 4 Price pressure....................... 4 Efficiency, automation, virtualization and scale.......... 5 Upselling, value-added services and the hosting channel......... 5 Consolidation....................... 6 Managed services and the move upstream............ 6 SOME KEY PROVIDERS PUBLIC AND PRIVATE............. 7 Figure 2: Key Public/Private Providers............... 8 MARKET SHARE ANALYSIS, KEY DEVELOPMENTS............ 9 Methodology and structure................... 9 MARKET DATA AND SELECTED COMPANY PROFILES........... 10 Figure 3: Global Web and Application Hosting Revenue........ 10 Figure 4: Global Web and Application Largest 10 Providers...... 10 Market sizing and sector breakdown.............. 17 Figure 5: Global Market Segmentation.............. 17 PERSPECTIVES AND ANALYSIS 19 KEY STRATEGIC TRENDS..................... 19 Cloud as a hosting provider line of business............ 19 The evolving SMB Web presence................ 21 The disruptive effect of freemium in the hosting space.........22 Office 365, Google Apps and the email reseller opportunity...... 24 High-value services and bundling driving increased ARPU........25 International markets, targets for expansion, trends..........27 Figure 6: Geographic Breakdown: Total Hosting Market, 2012-2016....27
KEY MARKET TRENDS...................... 29 The new gtld process and the hosting business.......... 29 Hosting platform evolution continues with new technologies....... 31 The growing wholesale market................ 32 The CDN opportunity in the hosting space.............33 Legislative threats to the hosting business............ 34 FINANCE AND M&A 36 FINANCING.......................... 36 MERGERS AND ACQUISITIONS................... 36 CONCLUSIONS AND RECOMMENDATIONS 42 RECOMMENDATIONS....................... 42 CONCLUSION.......................... 43 APPENDIX 44 TAXONOMY/GLOSSARY...................... 44 WEB AND APPLICATION HOSTING SUMMER 2013
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