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IDC's Worldwide Quarterly Ethernet Switch and Router Trackers Show Ethernet Switch Market Nearly Flat in 2Q15, and a Strengthening Router Market
[August 27, 2015]

IDC's Worldwide Quarterly Ethernet Switch and Router Trackers Show Ethernet Switch Market Nearly Flat in 2Q15, and a Strengthening Router Market


The worldwide Ethernet switch market (Layer 2/3) produced revenues of $5.8 billion in the second quarter of 2015 (2Q15), an increase of 1.0% year over year and an increase of 7.6% quarter over quarter. Meanwhile, the worldwide total enterprise and service provider router market continued to rebound from recent year-over-year declines, growing revenues 11.5% year over year in 2Q15 and also growing 11.5% sequentially. These growth rates are according to preliminary results published in the International Data Corporation (IDC) Worldwide Quarterly Ethernet Switch Tracker and Worldwide Quarterly Router Tracker.

From a geographic perspective, the 2Q15 Ethernet switch market performed best in North America, which grew 5.1% year over year and 13.7% quarter over quarter. Asia/Pacific including Japan (APJ) saw a small decline of -2.4% year over year despite a 12.3% sequential increase. Latin America, normally a strong growth market, declined -2.9% year over year and -5.1% quarter over quarter. The Europe, Middle East & Africa region (EMEA) was also relatively weak in 2Q15, declining -2.4% year over year and -3.2% quarter over quarter.

"Overall revenue and port shipment growth was weaker than expected in 2Q15. Even the relatively strong 10Gb segment saw weaker results than expected," said Rohit Mehra, Vice President, Network Infrastructure, at IDC (News - Alert). "Given the increasing workloads traversing networks across the enterprise, datacenter, and with service providers, this weakness is likely the result of anticipation for and delayed decision-making around newer and emerging speeds, the intensifying competitive landscape, and of course, continued macroeconomic concerns."

10Gb Ethernet switch (Layer 2/3) revenue decreased -3.9% year over year, coming in at just under $2.1 billion while 10Gb Ethernet switch port shipments grew a robust 16.4% year over year with nearly 7.3 million ports shipped in 2Q15, as average selling prices continued to fall. 40Gb Ethernet revenue came in at over $500 million for the third consecutive quarter in 2Q15, growing 59.7% year over year. 10Gb and 40Gb Ethernet are expected to continue to be the primary drivers of the overall Ethernet switch market in the near-term. 1Gb Ethernet switch revenue declined slightly (-1.5% year-over-year) as this segment continues to face price erosion.

The worldwide enterprise and service provider router market increased 11.5% year over year in 2Q15. Contrary to the previous quarter, both the enterprise and service provider segments saw strong growth. The enterprise segment increased 8.3% year over year and 7.7% quarter over quarter in 2Q15. The service provider segment performed especially well, growing 12.5% year over year and 12.7% quarter over quarter. This will be a market to watch closely over the coming quarters as software-defined architectures start to take hold across the WAN, enabling network managers and service providers alike to benefit from these emerging capabilities.

The combined enterprise and service provider router market also saw strong performances across the regions. Latin America led all regions with a 26.7% year-over-year growth rate and 25.1% sequential growth rate. APJ also saw a positive quarter, growing 8.9% on an annual basis in 2Q15. North America increasd 11.3% year over year. EMEA saw routers as a bright spot in an overall dampened enterprise networking market with a year-over-year growth rate of 10.4%.



Vendor Highlights

Cisco (News - Alert) finished the quarter with 1.9% year-over-year growth in the Ethernet switching market and market share of 59.9%, up slightly from its 59.4% share in 2Q14. In the hotly contested 10GbE segment, Cisco held 57.5% of the market in 2Q15, down from 61.1% in the previous quarter, and from the 60.9% it held in 2Q14. Cisco's service provider and enterprise router revenue increased 14.9% year-over-year.


HP's Ethernet switch revenue decreased -2.6% year over year, but grew 22.9% quarter over quarter in 2Q15. HP's market share in switching rose to 9.5% from 8.3% in the first quarter of 2015, but was down from the 9.9% share it held in 2Q14.

Juniper rebounded from a down first quarter in Ethernet switching with a year-over-year increase of 6.9% and sequential growth of 15.5% in 2Q15. Its router revenue declined year-over-year for the fourth consecutive quarter, falling by -4.5% on a year-over-year basis, despite increasing 18.8% sequentially.

"Falling switch port prices have a flattening effect on overall market growth, even as demand for switches, especially 10Gb and 40Gb Ethernet switch ports, increases," said Petr Jirovsky, Research Manager in IDC's Networking Trackers Group. "As newer standards at higher speeds such as 25Gb, 50Gb, and 100Gb Ethernet grow to critical mass over the next few years, one can expect this segment to stay dynamic and interesting for the foreseeable future."

An interactive graphic showing the relative market shares of the top 5 vendors in the worldwide Layer 2/3 Ethernet switch market over the previous five quarters is available here. The chart is intended for public use in online news articles and social media. Instructions on how to embed this graphic can be found by viewing this press release on IDC.com.

The Worldwide Quarterly Ethernet Switch Tracker and the Worldwide Quarterly Router Tracker provide total market size and vendor shares for the Ethernet switch and router technologies in an easy-to-use Excel pivot table format. The geographic coverage for both the Ethernet switch market and the router market includes eight major regions (USA, Canada, Latin America, Asia/Pacific (excluding Japan), Japan, Western Europe, Central and Eastern Europe, and Middle East and Africa) and 60 countries. The Ethernet switch market is further segmented by speed (100Mb, 1000Mb, 10Gb, 40Gb, 100Gb), product (fixed managed, fixed unmanaged, modular), and layer (L2, L3, L4-7). Measurement for the Ethernet switch market is provided in vendor revenue, value, and port shipments. The router market is further split by product (high-end, mid-range, low-end, SOHO), deployment (service provider, enterprise), connectivity (core, edge), and the measurements are in vendor revenue, value, and unit shipments.

For more information about IDC's Worldwide Quarterly Ethernet Switch and Router Trackers, please contact Kathy Nagamine ([email protected]).

About IDC Trackers
IDC Tracker products provide accurate and timely market size, vendor share, and forecasts for hundreds of technology markets from more than 100 countries around the globe. Using proprietary tools and research processes, IDC's Trackers are updated on a semiannual, quarterly, and monthly basis. Tracker results are delivered to clients in user-friendly excel deliverables and online query tools. The IDC Tracker Charts app allows users to view data charts from the most recent IDC Tracker products on their iPhone and iPad. The IDC Tracker Chart app is also available for Android Phones and Android Tablets.

About IDC
International Data Corporation (IDC) is the premier global provider of market intelligence, advisory services, and events for the information technology, telecommunications, and consumer technology markets. With more than 1,100 analysts worldwide, IDC offers global, regional, and local expertise on technology and industry opportunities and trends in over 110 countries. IDC's analysis and insight helps IT professionals, business executives, and the investment community to make fact-based technology decisions and to achieve their key business objectives. Founded in 1964, IDC is a subsidiary of IDG, the world's leading technology media, research, and events company. To learn more about IDC, please visit www.idc.com. Follow IDC on Twitter (News - Alert) at @IDC.

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