"The common drivers pushing the carrier router and switch market upward are 1) the ongoing migration to next generation networks based on IP, MPLS, and Ethernet, and 2) growth in consumer broadband, corporate, IP video, and mobile data traffic," said Michael Howard, principal analyst and co-founder of Infonetics. "Of course, the traffic jams are being caused by user applications, like music and video downloading, YouTube clips (even corporations are using YouTube for marketing videos), online news, and social networks like MySpace.
As an example, I recently watched video feeds of the Amgen Tour of California bicycle race for a few hours at a time, something not possible a year ago."
Other highlights from the report:
- Cisco's router and switch sales are up 20% year-over-year, Juniper's are up 25%
- After 11% and 9% sequential jumps in the second and third quarters, the overall market is relatively quiet in the fourth quarter, up 2% sequentially
- The 40G market for routers and WDM is on the uptake; 100G is at least 2 years out
- In 2007, Juniper pulls ahead of Alcatel-Lucent to gain the #2 spot in worldwide market share for service provider routers and switches; Cisco maintains its strong overall lead
- Worldwide carrier Ethernet switch (CES) port shipments are up 36% in 2007; Cisco continues to lead by far in this segment, followed by Huawei and Nokia Siemens
The report tracks Alcatel-Lucent, Avici, Ciena, Cisco, ECI, Ericsson, Extreme, Foundry, Fujitsu, Hitachi Cable, Huawei, Juniper, NEC, Nokia Siemens, Nortel, Redback, Tellabs, and others.