Enterprise upgrades propel network equipment market

Wednesday, 13 October 2010 20:27

Overall sales in networking and telecommunications equipment during the second quarter of 2010 approached $29 billion, roughly flat with the year ago period, according to recently published reports by Dell'Oro Group. Decreases in spending and component shortages in the Mobile Radio Access market offset strong growth in other industry sectors, particularly in equipment designed for enterprise applications. The two highest growth sectors in the second quarter this year were Ethernet Switch and Wireless LAN, with sales that surged more than 30 percent from the same quarter of last year. Growth in Ethernet sales came from upgrades of desktop LAN switches and 10Gbps deployments in data centers. Wireless LAN sales were bolstered by a fundamental shift in the willingness of enterprises to support Wi-Fi enabled handheld devices in addition to laptop computers. Sectors with the weakest performance were those often sold in conjunction with Mobile Radio Access, Microwave Transmission and Wireless Packet Core equipment that connects the radio access network with the Internet or other data networks. "Suppliers that benefitted the most over the past four quarters from enterprise desktop LAN and data center upgrades were Cisco, HP, F5, and Juniper," says Tam Dell'Oro, president and founder of Dell'Oro Group. "Suppliers that benefitted the most over the same time period on Wireless LAN were Aruba, Cisco, Meru, Motorola, and Trapeze.”