• Subscriber Values • ISP Rankings • Buy Reports

Two Views of Global Transport Market

Two studies of the worldwide optical global transport market say the sector is off, but one shows a more-substantial slide.

by Bob Woods of opticallynetworked.com [February 25, 2002]

Market-research firm RHK said the global transport market in 2001 saw $28.2 billion in revenues, down from the $33 billion estimated for 2000.

Alcatel led the market in 2001 with a 16 percent share, followed by Lucent at 12 percent and Nortel at 11 percent. Fujitsu was next at 9 percent, followed by Ciena, Marconi, and NEC, all at 6 percent each. Siemens and Tycom were at 5 percent each, with Tellabs at 4 percent and Cisco at 3 percent.

The turbulence in the global market has resulted in a changing picture of market shares. Alcatel was number two in 2000. The company moved up, RHK said, because of its well-balanced exposure to markets across the globe, with significant sales on all continents, and its broad customer mix (incumbent PTTs, pan-European carriers, CLECs).

Nortel held the number one position in 2000. RHK said it slipped to third place because of its dropping sales in North America.

Lucent assumed the number two position in 2001 with a 12 percent share in the global optical transport market. Helping Lucent was its successful introduction of its LambdaRouter and strong deployment of its Bandwidth Manager, RHK also said.

Fujutsu held onto fourth place with a 9 percent share. Ciena's CoreDirector, an optical core switch, and WDM products helped the company increase its share from 3 percent to 6 percent.

It is important to note that "other" companies came in at 13 percent, putting that group between Alcatel and Lucent in terms of market share in 2001.

RHK said it defines the optical transport market to include all major categories of equipment used in optical fiber networks: SONET/SDH [definition], MSP, OED, traditional and superband DCS, WDM [definition], OADM, and OCS equipment.

"Although the North American and undersea optical transport segments were hit hard this past year, we foresee growth of at least 15 percent in the Asia-Pacific and the MEA (Middle East and African) regions," said Stephane Teral, director of European and global optical transport at RHK. "We expect the European market size to remain the same in 2002. Globally, it will be the incumbent PTTs and Bell companies that continue to dominate spending through 2002."

"The market with the strongest growth remains China," Teral said. "Here we see the local vendors going from strength to strength: Huawei has emerged as the country's strongest maker - and it now has significant impact and potential in Europe."

RHK said its new market share data is based on interviews with over 30 key terrestrial and undersea optical transport vendors and 40 service providers on their spending patterns. A detailed analysis of the Global Transport Market Share is available from RHK.

RHK released the figures at the STARTRAX2002 European conference in Paris.

The Dell'Oro Group, meantime, says the worldwide optical transport market slid 15.6 percent to $15.6 billion in 2001, as compared to 2000.

Dell'Oro defines the market as including DWDM—Long Haul Terrestrial, DWDM—Metro, and SONET/SDH Multiplexers.

In the fourth quarter, revenues for DWDM—Long Haul and SONET/SDH were down as compared to the same quarter in 2000, posting declines of 30 percent and 27 percent respectively. DWDM—Metro was the only segment to post quarter-to-quarter growth of 12 percent in 2001, with revenues of $170 million.

— End