Networking equipment provider QLogic is showing off a new report by the Dell’Oro Group that concludes that the company is the biggest fibre channel adapter vendor by market share in Q1 2012. That’s the 33^rd consecutive quarter through which QLogic retains the title it has been sporting for the past eight years.

The research firm found that the company accounted for 57 percent of all fibre channel revenue in the first quarter, adding that it has taken share ‘directly from its closest competitor.’ QLogic has a lead of about 20 percent over the said rival, and it gained 3.6 percentage points quarter over quarter to top it off.

Here’s the executive quote:

“These latest share gains confirm the market preference for QLogic Fibre Channel Adapters as customers around the globe continue to trust QLogic’s solutions to power their mission-critical storage networks,” said Amit Vashi, vice president of marketing, Host Solutions Group, QLogic.

In spite of the fibre channel lead, QLogic is under pressure to recover from the poor sales it reported in its latest earnings call, and Wall Street will be looking at the networking vendor’s performance in its core markets throughout the next three months.

A few days after the company released its fiscal results QLogic announced a development that underscores this goal – a partnership with Extreme Networks to bundle up its data center switches with QLogic’s fibre channel adapters and FCoE solutions. The vision is to provide a solution that eliminates some of the trouble that comes with the creation of a more converged networking environment in the data center.

Also this week, a new player emerged in this industry.  Taiwanese hardware manufacturer Quanta is opening up a new U.S unit dedicated to selling networking gear.