Ethernet Switch and Router Market Totals $12.8 Billion

While some aspects of the tech market have been slow to recover from the downturn, clearly the network equipment is seeing dramatic growth. Sean Michael Kerner reports.

According to a new report from Infonetics Research, the market for Service Provider routers and switches continued to grow at a double-digit pace in 2010. The company reports that the carrier Ethernet switch and IP router market was worth $12.8 billion in 2010 — a 20.5 percent increase over the 2009 tally.

With the continued growth has also come a change in the relative market positions of the top three vendors. Cisco continues to lead the market, though Infonetics now sees Alcatel-Lucent in the number two spot ahead of Juniper Networks.

“Alcatel-Lucent has been steadily taking IP router market share for the past three years, to the point that, even though they only play in the edge router segment, they are now number two worldwide in the total IP edge and core router market,” Michael Howard, co-founder and principal analyst for carrier and data center networks at Infonetics Research said in a statement. “ALU had its best-ever quarter in IP edge routers, with revenue up 56 percent sequentially in the fourth quarter of 2010, pushing them above Juniper, which also posted solid growth.”

Read the rest about Ethernet Switch and Router Market at Enterprise Networking Planet.