The software defined data center (SDDC) market will  grow from $21 billion to more than $77 billion over the next five years, according to a new report.

Market research firm Research and Markets predicts that companies will aim to reduce their data center capex by taking advantage of a small set of technologies; software defined networking (SDN), software defined storage (SDS), virtualization on-demand for server and compute services.

To reach the estimated compound annual growth rate (CAGR) of 28.8 percent from 2015 to 2020 that the report identifies, R&M has included additional technologies in a rather loose concordance with the overall category of SDDC. These other technologies include cloud and telecommunications service providers, application on demand, and scale from end user to enterprise business. Overall the expectation is that there will be software based management applications that are able to provide management across the range of technologies.

The report also looks at where these investments are being made, with North America being more than 52 percent of the world market for SDDC. Their research has shown that the majority of medium and large businesses in this region are moving towards software defined solutions as a part of their growth planning, with a hoped-for reduction in opex.

The report states that current major hardware vendors are all looking at taking advantage of SDDC. While there are many new start-ups looking to gain a toehold with software defined technologies, the current crop of leading hardware manufacturers isn’t giving up without a fight. It is likely that the success of hardware vendors will depend more on service and support than on other aspects of the SDDC, especially if startups focused on making the hardware invisible and interchangeable are successful.