NOVEMBER 11, 2008 -- Service providers in Asia Pacific are investing heavily in PON technology, reveals a new report from Infonetics Research (search for Infonetics Research). They are on track to buy more than 5.5 million EPON, GPON, and WDM-PON ports in 2008, a 37% increase over 2007, with strong annual port growth expected through at least 2011.
The report, "PON Equipment in Asia Pacific," confirms that Asia Pacific is the hotbed for PON technology, accounting for 55% of worldwide PON equipment manufacturer revenue in 2007.
Service providers in Asia Pacific, like providers elsewhere in the world, are building out PON and Ethernet FTTH networks to better compete for subscribers by offering faster, cheaper, more synchronous broadband connections. Service providers in many Asia Pacific countries have the added incentive to aggressively transition to fiber because of government initiatives to reach national broadband connection goals.
These drivers will fuel PON equipment manufacturer revenue derived from service providers in Asia Pacific to more than triple between 2007 and 2011.
"Japan is the current growth engine behind the PON market in Asia Pacific, with South Korea and China poised to fuel long-term growth in the EPON and GPON equipment markets," reports Jeff Heynen, directing analyst for broadband and IPTV at Infonetics Research. "Short-term growth will no doubt be impacted by the current economic climate around the globe, but long-term the PON market will continue to flourish in Asia, in large part because many governments there are subsidizing fiber rollouts and relaxing regulatory restrictions as a means of reaching national goals to connect tens of millions of broadband subscribers."
"This is the case in Japan, South Korea, China, Indonesia, and Malaysia, to name a few," adds Heynen.
Other highlights from the report include the following:
• 84% of Asia Pacific PON equipment revenue was from Japan in 2007; this will change significantly by 2011, as Japan's market matures and other Asian countries step up their PON deployments.
• By the end of 2008, PON equipment manufacturer revenue in China will have surged more than 10-fold due to FTTB and FTTH network rollouts for the 2008 Beijing Olympics.
• EPON is by far the most popular PON technology in Asia Pacific, representing 96% of the market in 2007, due to Japan's almost exclusive use of EPON and growing EPON deployments in China and South Korea.
• Domestic vendors are preferred in Asia Pacific; for example in Japan, Mitsubishi and Sumitomo together hold 61% of the EPON market, followed by Hitachi and Fujitsu.
Infonetics' report tracks EPON, GPON, and WDM-PON OLTs and ONTs split by FTTH and FTTB in China, Japan, South Korea, and the rest of Asia Pacific, as well as the total Asia Pacific region. The report provides market share, market size, CY07 to CY11 forecasts by country and region, and in-depth analysis.
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