Worldwide networking port revenues hit $39 billion says Infonetics

Market research firm Infonetics Research says worldwide revenues from 1 Gigabit, 10 Gigabit, 40 Gigabit, and 100 Gigabit optical and Ethernet ports grew 5% in 2013 compared to the prior year, reaching $39 billion. Enterprise port revenue grew 5%, and service provider port revenue increased 4%, the firm adds.

The figures come from Infonetics’ latest “1G/10G/40G/100G Networking Ports” report, which explores the demand for such network ports, the size of the market and how fast each segment is growing, and which technologies and speeds are being adopted on various types of enterprise and service provider equipment.

"Deployments of 1G, 10G, 40G, and 100G ports once again grew significantly in 2013, as enterprises and service providers invested in their networks to accommodate the growth in traffic, and revenue growth accelerated as buyers shifted to higher bandwidth and more expensive ports," said Matthias Machowinski, directing analyst for enterprise networks and video at Infonetics Research.

1G comprises the lion's share of ports, while 10G delivers the bulk of revenue, though revenue growth is coming from the emerging 40G and 100G segments, according to the report.

The 40G market is in transition as service providers move on to 100G; 40G is, however, finding success in the data center network market, resulting in 40G port shipments more than doubling in 2013. Infonetics looks for 40G port shipments to nearly triple this year, hitting 1.5 million

Shipments of 100G ports almost quadrupled in 2013, thanks to surging service provider demand for 100G wavelengths.

"Coherent 100G is well on its way to completely taking over the core, growing to nearly 80% of all wavelengths by 2016, effectively shutting down competing 10G and 40G deployments," said Andrew Schmitt, principal analyst for optical at Infonetics and co-author of the report.

Meanwhile, although the first 100G ports on enterprise equipment started shipping in 2013, 100 Gigabit Ethernet ports aren't expected to become a major factor until 2015.

Infonetics says its biannual networking ports report tracks port revenue, port shipments, and port pricing for enterprise routers, Ethernet switches, and other enterprise communications equipment, as well as service provider IP edge routers, IP core routers, Carrier Ethernet switches, CPE, broadband access, WDM and SONET/SDH optical, and other service provider communications equipment.

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