Metro Ethernet Rising in Asia

Metro Ethernet is not just a North American or European phenomenon. Asia’s got it, too, and it’s hitting big.

According to a recent report from Yankee Group, the Asia-Pacific region is worth $675 million in Metro Ethernet revenues, second only to Europe.

Within Asia, China is expected to be the fastest-developing market for Metro Ethernet revenues, while India is noted as being an important market.

Yankee Group cites a gradual network migration and growing bandwidth requirements as some of the reasons for Metro Ethernet growth in Asia.

Legacy packet data services may well be the losing side of the equation as Ethernet moves in.

“Ethernet is inching into the WAN environment at the expense of traditional packet data services, such as frame relay and ATM in the corporate market,” Agatha Poon senior analyst at Yankee Group, told internetnews.com.

“With the imminent adoption of IP-based services, Ethernet will increase the pace of IP migration.

“That being said, the capability of Ethernet to scale up to tens of gigabits of bandwidth increases market appeal and drives ‘organic growth.'”

The dominance of Ethernet in Asia, though, is not without its challenges, as there are still some barriers to adoption.

This article was first published on InternetNews.com. To read the full article, click here.