Gartner Expert

Adrian O'Connell

Sr Director Analyst

Adrian O'Connell is a Senior Director Analyst at Gartner, where he is part of the Technology Market Insights team focusing on the server and overall data center infrastructure markets.

As part of that team, Mr. O'Connell analyzes technology developments, end-user requirements and business model changes that relate to data center infrastructure and server markets.

Current key focus areas include the impact of AI on the server market and data centers. There are multiple aspects of this ranging from AI server types (ie GPU vs ASIC), customer deployment types (ie public cloud vs on-prem) as well as implications of AI models on system architecture and capacity requirements. Other areas of coverage are Arm servers, ODM vs OEM dynamics, consumption-based pricing (CBM / ICS), data center customer segmentation, edge computing as well as the impact of cloud computing on server sales

Mr. O'Connell maintains a global view for all server types and contributes to the worldwide forecast and market share, as well as the integrated systems research areas.

Previous experience

Prior to working with the server team, Mr. O'Connell spent two years with Gartner's PC group, where his main responsibilities were in running the European PC Quarterly Statistics Program, as well as the analysis of the U.K., Dutch and Nordic PC markets.

Professional background

Gartner, Research Director, 28 years

Areas of coverage
  • Technology Market Essentials

Education

B.A., with honors, Linguistics, School of Cognitive and Computing Sciences at the University of Sussex

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Top Issues That I Help Clients Address

01

Impact of AI on the server market and data centers

02

Server market trends, opportunities and positioning

03

Consumption-based pricing (hardware as a service)

04

Integrated systems - opportunities in data center hardware convergence

05

Open compute and ODM sourcing - shifts in server design and manufacturing