With WiFi (News - Alert) comes SIP, and with SIP comes VoIP, and with VoIP, one can make cheap calls, thus WiFi is good for users of mobile devices. Right?

Perhaps that is why a recent study from Infonetics Research shows the global WiFi phone market exploding.

According to the study, the worldwide WiFi phone market jumped 116 percent between 2004 and 2005, to $125.5 million, and is projected to more than double in 2006. Driving the growth is enterprise and consumer deployment of voice over wireless LANs.

In fact, the study predicts that the WiFi phone market could double, possibly almost triple, each year between now and 2009. By that year, the study predicts, the worldwide market will have reached around $3.7 billion.

Although WiFi telephony has traditionally been the realm of the mobile enterprise, it is gaining in popularity with consumers as well. Some residential broadband providers are now offering their customers free or low cost WiFi for their homes, as part of their bundled broadband packages, and this is driving consumer adoption of WiFi telephony. Many of these customers are now opting for dual-mode WiFi/cellular phones, so that they can make VoIP calls using their handsets and also achieve seamless call handover between networks.

“Single-mode WiFi VoIP handsets continue to penetrate the enterprise market, and with D-Link, Linksys (News - Alert), and NETGEAR all launching products, we expect increasing adoption in the consumer market, too,” said Richard Webb, directing wireless analyst with Infonetics Research, in a press release. “But the real growth will come from dual-mode WiFi (News - Alert)/cellular handsets. With the increased activity from both fixed and mobile operators to deliver dual-mode services to the mass market, often as part of a more far-reaching fixed-mobile convergence strategy, the long-term forecast for dual-mode WiFi/cellular handsets is strong, assuming these handsets come down in price to sub-100 dollars or euros.”

The study finds that SpectraLink led the WiFi phone market, in terms of revenue, in 2005, followed by Cisco and Motorola (News - Alert).

It also predicts that the total number of WiFi phone units grew 151 percent between 2004 and 2005, and will grow 182 percent between 2005 and 2006.

Additionally, the study finds that 58 percent of WiFi phone revenue came from single-mode WiFi handsets, while 42 percent was derived from dual-mode handsets, in 2005.

The study predicts that by 2009, 91 percent of revenue will come from dual-mode handsets.

For more information, visit www.infonetics.com.

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Patrick Barnard is Associate Editor for TMCnet and a columnist covering the telecom industry. To see more of his articles, please visit Patrick Barnard’s columnist page.


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