The market for application containers, largely led by the open-source Docker container engine, has been a hot area in recent years, at least in terms of mindshare — but how much money is there in the container market right now? A new forecast from 451 Research aims to answer that question.
According to 451 Research, the market for application container technologies in 2016 generated $762 million in revenue. 
Looking forward to 2020, 451 Research is forecasting that 2020 revenue will reach $2.7 billion, for a 40 percent compound annual growth rate.
The upward revenue growth trajectory for application containers is not a surprise given some of the current adoption trends. 451 Research conducted a study in April and May 2016 that found 14 percent of surveyed organizations were using Docker containers in production. Additionally, nearly 31 percent of surveyed organizations indicated they were piloting or evaluating Docker containers.