Lumen tops Vertical Systems Group’s 2021 U.S. Wavelength Services Leaderboard

Vertical Systems Group (VSG) says that Lumen attained the top market share spot on its year-end 2021 U.S. Wavelength Services Leaderboard. Other service providers joining Lumen on the Leaderboard --- Zayo, Verizon, AT&T, Arelion (formerly Telia Carrier), Windstream, Crown Castle, and Cox, in ranked order by market share – all attained at least 1% market share in terms of U.S. wavelength circuits provided. As defined by VSG, a wavelength circuit provides a Layer 1 dedicated bidirectional gigabit-speed optical fiber connection between two sites.

This is the first year VSG has announced a Wavelength Services Leaderboard. The market research firm’s other Leaderboards rank service providers in such areas as fiber-lit buildings and Ethernet services provision.

VSG typically breaks up service providers into three tiers when announcing new rankings: Leaderboard, Challenge Tier, and Market Participants/Players, in descending order of market share or penetration. It is perhaps indicative of the fragmentation among the U.S. wavelength service market that the Leaderboard companies were required to have on 1% of the market and the rest of the companies VSG tracks in this area were assigned Market Player status. Those companies for 2021 include, in alphabetical order: Altice USA, Armstrong Business Solutions, Astound Business Solutions, Colt, Consolidated Communications, C Spire, Comcast, DQE Communications, Epsilon, Everstream, Exa Infrastructure (formerly GTT), ExteNet Systems, Fatbeam, FiberLight, FirstLight, Frontier, Great Plains Communications, Logix Fiber Networks, LS Networks, Midco, Ritter Communications, Segra, Shentel Business, Silver Star Telecom, Sparklight Business, Spectrum Enterprise, Syringa, T-Mobile, TDS Telecom, Unite Private Networks, Uniti, US Signal, Veracity, WOW!Business, Ziply Fiber, and others.

Regardless of the fragmentation, companies in this space operate in an expanding market. “U.S. demand for wavelength services is rising to support mission-critical applications that require assured performance, deterministic latency, and gigabit speed connectivity,” said Rick Malone, principal of Vertical Systems Group. “Our forecasts show double-digit growth this year, driven by high demand for 100-Gbps wavelength circuits.”

That growth should continue, with VSG estimating revenue for U.S. wavelength services will increase at a 13% CAGR between 2021 and 2026. Retail wavelength circuits were more popular than wholesale deployments last year, VSG adds.

Vertical Systems Group’s @Wavelength research is available by subscription to an ENS Research Program. ENS Wavelength services research quantifies U.S. market revenue and circuits by speed, wholesale vs. retail services, circuits by geographic scope, pricing by speed, purchase drivers, top verticals and use cases, attributes of Ethernet vs. Dark Fiber vs. Wavelength services, and more.

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