Cell Backhaul to Drive Edge Router Market

According to the Dell'Oro Group, investment in routers for mobile backhaul networks will be the primary driver for the service provider edge router market through 2018. The demand for these routers is expected to propel the worldwide service provider router market to almost $9 billion by 2018.

"As LTE networks are being deployed in China and across Europe, router demand in mobile backhaul networks is taking off, with service providers expanding capacity to handle data traffic generated by LTE users," said Alam Tamboli, business analyst at Dell'Oro. "In North America, we witnessed a rapid deployment cycle, whereas in the case of Europe, we expect the cycle to be longer due to differences in the competitive landscape and a larger population size."

North America drove worldwide demand for routers in mobile backhaul networks from 2009 through 2013. LTE coverage in this region is now largely complete, and several of the service providers have begun to taper their investment levels there.