A recently published report by Dell'Oro Group reveals that in the fourth quarter of 2011, overall wireless LAN (WLAN) revenues grew 14% to $1.7 billion over the same period last year, driven in part by a 10% quarter-over-quarter increase in enterprise WLAN selling prices.
According to the research, nearly a half-million units of enterprise-class and outdoor WiFi devices were shipped to service providers in 2011, up 170% year-over-year. The largest vertical markets for WiFi overall, by units shipped, in the second half of 2011 included: education at 22%; healthcare at 14%; and carpeted enterprise at 12%.
"While traditional vertical markets such as education, healthcare and the carpeted enterprise remain the largest contributors to the enterprise segment, rapid growth in the service provider vertical is changing to the WLAN industry," commented Chris DePuy, analyst of Wireless LAN research at Dell'Oro Group. "The outdoor WiFi market is undergoing a rapid pace of innovation as service providers demand integration between cellular and WiFi radio technologies, as well as increased user management capabilities."
The research states that in the fourth quarter, Cisco Systems maintained the majority revenue market share in the enterprise WLAN market, followed by Aruba Networks and Hewlett Packard. In the SOHO market, Netgear retained the number one revenue rank, followed by Cisco Systems and D-Link. In the Outdoor Mesh segment, BelAir Networks was number one by revenue, followed by Tropos Networks and Ruckus Wireless.
Dell'Oro says that it expects shipments of 802.11ac-based SOHO WLAN devices before the end of 2012 and of Enterprise WLAN by 2013.
Source: Dell'Oro Group
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