Revenue from 100G fibre to surpass $1bn in 2013

This year, 100G fibre is expected to generate revenues of over $1bn for the first time, according to research firm Ovum. The firm analysed financial results from 1Q13 in the global optical networking market and found several trends, including one disappointing trend that market growth overall remained difficult, with only Japan’s Fujitsu posting sequential and year-on-year gains.

“While it is not uncommon for the market to decline going into the first calendar quarter, the decline is worrisome as this is the fifth straight time the market has declined versus the prior year’s quarter, and quarterly revenues are the lowest they’ve been in six years,” said Ron Kline, network infrastructure analyst at Ovum.

He added that 100G provided some encouragement, as it continued to show strong growth both sequentially and year over year. 100G port shipments in 1Q13 grew 41 per cent and revenues grew 24 cent compared with 4Q12, with annualised revenues surpassing $1bn for the first time.

“Twenty vendors shipped 100G for revenue in 1Q13 and more are slated to enter the market throughout the year. Guidance from vendors is cautiously optimistic, with good short-term visibility into order growth; long-term visibility remains cloudy.”

Ovum’s analysis also revealed that Chinese vendor ZTE surpassed rival Alcatel-Lucent in global optical networking market over the quarter. This means that the top two slots in the market are now held by Chinese vendors, with Huawei with the greatest market share.