Wireless Packet Core Revenue Grows With Mobile Demand

A new study by networking and telecommunication industries research firm Dell'Oro Group has found that the overall wireless packet core market grew twenty six percent during the first quarter of 2014, compared to the same period one year ago.

Wireless packet core refers to a framework that offers converged data and voice services, primarily used to combine data and voice to Internet Protocol.   Mass market adoption of mobile broadband has generated a growing need for wireless packet core systems.  Messaging, in particular text messaging, is showing strong growth both in terms of revenue and profitability. 

The mobile packet core is important in shaping the end user's quality of experience, which means it is central to the success or failure of mobile operators in building a sustainable business model for data services. The growing need among communication service providers to upgrade their packet core network to support LTE technology is forecast to drive demand for converged LTE packet core solutions, according to the study.

The research firm found that North American session growth nearly tripled following a slowdown in the third and fourth quarters of 2013, and nearly half of service provider bid responses required specifications for upcoming availability of Network Function Virtualization (NFV) capabilities from packet core vendors.

Chris DePuy, vice president at Dell'Oro Group, stated that Asian markets are expected to become the largest buyers of packet core systems.

"Over the next five years, we expect the Asia Pacific and Middle East regions to become the largest buyers of Evolved Packet Core (EPC) systems,” noted DePuy.

“What makes this situation so interesting is that vendors are just beginning to offer NFV based systems and so new service provider deployments in Asia Pacific are likely to become the most significant users of NFV,” he said.

In looking ahead to 2018, Dell’Oro expects to see substantial growth—all coming from the Evolved Packet Core segment of the market.  Dell’Oro is forecasting a nearly 60 percent growth in the sector.