Global consumption of fiber-optic cable to peak at 21.5% annual growth rate in 2002

Global consumption of fiber-optic cable to peak at 21.5% annual growth rate in 2002

The latest Global Fiber Optic Cable Market Forecast from ElectroniCast Corp. (San Mateo, CA) predicts an increase of 21% in fiber-optic cable consumption per year over the next five years, from $10.1 billion in 1997 to $26.8 billion by 2002.

The subocean segment of the global cable consumption, responsible for the sharp rise of global values from 1997 to 2002, will account for an overall sharp decline from 2002 to 2007, as less demand for submarine cable is predicted, from 38% growth in 1997 to only 18% by 2007. This drop will further contribute to the very slow average annual growth rate of 5% for total consumption between 2002 and 2007.

North America led in global cable consumption in 1997 with about 28% ($2.9 billion). The fastest growth for the next 10 years will occur in the Orest of the worldO regions (see charts), expanding from 2% in 1997 to 4% by 2007, representing an average annual growth rate of 26% from 2002 to 2007.

Telecommunications optical cable usage led consumption with 43% in 1997 and will grow to 51% in 2007, or from $4.3 billion to $17.3 billion. Private data local and wide area network (lan/wan) consumption, mostly multimode, will surge from 11% to 20%, or $1.1 billion to $6.8 billion.

North America, particularly the U.S., leads in deploying optical cable for premises lan/wan use. Cable- television consumption will grow slightly during the 10-year period, but from 2002 to 2007, much slower growth is anticipated as telephone companies expand into entertainment video provisioning.

The number of fibers per cable

will grow over the forecast period, says ElectroniCast. There will be some countervailing forces, such as dense wavelength-division multiplexing, faster optoelectronics, and passive fiber-in-the-loop systems, but they are only expected to slow growth. Otherwise, says the report, cables would have much higher fiber counts.

Use of singlemode fiber will grow from $9.1 billion in 1997 to $28.1 billion by 2007, an 83% share increase. Telecommunications networks dominate the consumption of singlemode cable, and premises use of singlemode fiber will be limited to campus-wide networks. Multimode fiber consumption, dominated by North America, will grow at an average annual growth rate of 18% from $1 billion in 1997 to $2.4 billion by 2002, then to $5.8 billion by 2007.

The Global Fiber Optic Cable Market Forecast Service is available from ElectroniCast for $8000 by calling Theresa Hosking at 650-343-1398 or by e-mail: [email protected]. u