Dittberner Forecasts High-End Router Market for Public Carrier Networks to Peak in 2006 then Decline

The High-End Router Market will Grow at a CAGR of 11% through 2008, with Revenues Growing from US$2.7 Billion in 2002 to US$5.5 Billion in 2006, then Falling to US$5.0 Billion by 2008.

Washington, D.C.- February 15, 2002 - According to its newly released report titled "High Performance Routers and Multiservice Switches for Public Networks," Dittberner Associates finds that the growth in high-end routers (OC-192/OC-48) will grow from US$2.7 billion in 2002 to a high of US$5.54 billion in 2006, then falling to US$4.99 billion in 2008, despite the forecasted growth of the worldwide Internet traffic from 3.7 Tbps in 2002 to 84.2 Tbps in 2008. This statement derives from Dittberner's exhaustive analyses of potential Internet traffic growth and their associated core router revenue and port shipment forecasts through the year 2008.

"Because of the introduction of new technologies such as OC-768 interfaces, vendor revenues for core backbone equipment is expected to decline as a result of the trend implying that twice the cost brings four times the traffic handling capacity," states Donald Dittberner, editor-in-chief and President of the company. He further adds that, "carriers always find ways to better utilize interconnection ports that are not generating revenue and to optimize customer connections, which also results in revenue decline for vendors."

However, Dittberner expects the worldwide mid-range router market to continue growing even after 2006, as vendors will be filling the backlog of orders from carriers that have been waiting for either MPLS or a more scalable switch fabric.

About the Report:
The information above is part of THE Dittberner PERSPECTIVE, Edition 46, a comprehensive 825-page report focusing on the technology and market forecast of high performance routers and multiservice switches. The report includes a detailed technical description of the currently available ATM / IP / MPLS routers and switches, along with cost-based price forecast for these products through the year 2008. Other topics covered in this study include:

• Major market trends affecting carrier network architectures
• Advanced broadband services networks and high-speed broadband access technologies
• Internet traffic forecast
• Carrier core and mid-range router / multiservice WAN switch market analysis and forecast
• Major market drivers of ATM / IP/ MPLS technology
• Short-term / long-term growth forecast of ATM, IP, and MPLS in public networks
• Architecture trends of the IP / ATM backbone
• Trends in high performance packet switching technology
• Comparative evaluation of high performance ATM / IP / MPLS switches and routers currently available
• Conclusions and recommendations for each type of Service Provider and for equipment vendors

In addition, the report provides case studies of twenty early adapters' experience with MPLS high performance switches and routers, as well as an extensive installed base and on order analyses of all public telecom carriers worldwide employing these equipment, sorted by country, operator, vendor, switch or router model, application, and number of units installed and on order.

For more information about this report, please contact the Sales or Marketing group at Tel. +1.888.652.83820, or e-mail sales@dittberner.com.

Dittberner Associates, Inc. 4641 Montgomery Avenue, Suite 100, Bethesda, MD 20814 USA

Telephone: +1 (888) 652-8382 Fax: +1 (301) 657-8084 E-mail: sales@dittberner.com