Business Ethernet Services Set to Reach $44B by 2014

Having just celebrated its 10^th anniversary, the MEF (Metro Ethernet Forum) continues to gain momentum through increased membership and other initiatives, which include an expansion of its certification program and new standards work in the access services and 4G mobile backhaul. MEF’s strategy for fully enabling Carrier Ethernet (CE) to support Private Cloud Computing also forms a major component of the forum’s current work plans.

MEF Global Marketing Co-chair Phil Tilley quoted Vertical Systems Group’s confirmation that the worldwide market for Business Ethernet services is on target to reach $44.3B by 2015 with double-digit global growth, despite recent economic uncertainty. Vertical also noted that 2011 marks two key tipping points in the Carrier Ethernet market. Firstly, that Ethernet access bandwidth has for the first time exceeded aggregate legacy bandwidth in the U.S. Secondly, the demand for higher speed Ethernet access at rates up to 10 or more Gbps is now taking off.

Focusing on CE equipment sales, IDC data predicts a $37.5Bn market by 2015, with Service Provider investment outpacing all other telecom capex, driven especially by the move to IP packet networks and growing traffic from consumer, business, and mobile backhaul networks, plus a steady growth in video. Ethernet now dominates spending on mobile backhaul, amounting to 89 percent of total in 2010 rising to 98 percent by 2015. In 2009 only 47 percent of operators were anticipating an all-IP strategy and that figure has now risen to nearly 80 percent.