Monday, August 22, 2011

North America Carrier Ethernet Service Revenue $11.5 Billion in 2015

North American Carrier Ethernet services will grow grow from $4.3 billion in 2011 to at least $11.5 billion ($10.5 billion in the United States alone) by 2015, for about a 29 percent compound annual growth rate, according to the Yankee Group.

           North American Carrier Ethernet Service Revenue
Transport and access revenue will increase less (at 28.8 percent CAGR), while management revenue associated with managed Ethernet products will grow far more (at a 30.6 percent CAGR over the same period). North American management revenue, which comprises just 5 percent of total Ethernet revenue today, will increase to 5.5 percent through 2015.

Ethernet service revenue from small and mid-sized businesses  (companies with up to 499 employees) in North America has grown from a relatively miniscule amount in the early 1990s to over $516 million in early 2011.

The Yankee Group expects SMB Ethernet services revenue to reach $3.47 billion by 2015, a 46.4 percent compount average growth rate.

Within North America, small businesses (those with up to 99 employees) accounted for about 25 percent of total SMB Ethernet revenue (or U.S.$130 million) in 2010. Yankee Group researchers forecast that increasing to over 31 percent ($1.08 billion) in 2015, for an approximate 53 percent CAGR.

Despite strong growth in the very small business segment (those with 1-49 employees), the bulk of actual revenue generated from small businesses will remain in the 50- to 99-employee small business segment by better than a 4-to-1 ratio through 2015.

Revenue from mid-size businesses (with 100 to 499 employees) will also grow from about U.S.$387 million to U.S.$2.39 billion (a 44 percent CAGR) during this same period.

Large businesses (those with more than 500 employees) comprise the bulk of Ethernet services market revenue and will exhibit strong growth, rising from $2.73 billion in 2010 to slightly over $8 billion in 2015, for a 24.2 percent CAGR.

Businesses (with 500 to 999 employees) will show the stronger growth at over 40 percent CAGR for the period, compared to only about 17 percent CAGR for the large enterprise space (firms with more than 1,000 employees).

Businesses with 500 to 999 employees will represent $3.37 billion of total large business revenue by the end of 2015. This discrepancy is more pronounced in Canada, where businesses are more concentrated in smaller business-size segments.

North American Enterprise, Small Business Ethernet Services Revenue

A global business generating $20 billion worth of revenue might be viewed a pretty big deal, even in a telecom business that generates $1.3 trillion annually. See this.

For this reason some observers would point to growing "Carrier Ethernet" service revenue as "the" answer for future growth. It might be more correct to say it is "a" driver of growth.

The most dramatic growth currently is in mobile backhaul, with Ethernet microwave anticipating a compound annual growth of 41 percent though 2015, according to Infonetics Research.

But assume 10 carriers represent about $745 billion worth of revenue, or about 57 percent of total global revenue. If those carriers were to earn a similar 57 percent share of the mobile backhaul revenue, they would share about $11.5 billion worth of revenue. For a carrier earning about $100 billion in annual revenue, that might be worth a percent point or two of total revenue.

Granted, one percent of a big number can, in turn, be a big number. But you have to keep matters in perspective. As important as any single source might be, in terms of gross revenue, even a billion dollars or so might not be that big a deal for a leading tier-one carrier. It might not be a terribly big deal for a smaller provider, either.

Consider Windstream, which in its second quarter of 2011 earned special access revenues increased $11 million year-over-year, or nine percent, due to circuit growth from increased demand for wireless backhaul services. Read more. That implies annual special access revenue of about $122 million. Annual business customer revenue is someplace around $1.2 billion, based on second quarter business customer revenue of $498 million.

That suggests all special access revenue is about 10 percent of business revenue. Carrier Ethernet would be a fraction of that. The point is that one has to keep perspective when looking at big numbers. 
Keeping carrier Ethernet service revenues in perspective

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