FENRUARY 7, 2007 -- FTM Consulting's (search for FTM Consulting) new study, "Structured Cabling Systems Market," indicates a resumption of double-digit growth in 2006, driven by the need for network congestion relief in networks experiencing bottlenecks, such as the data centers (search for data center).
The need for higher speeds will primarily include Gigabit Ethernet (search for Gigabit Ethernet) speeds in excess of 1 Gbits/sec. This will require fiber cabling, as copper cabling will not provide the requisite performance. FTM analysis indicates that copper UTP cabling will underperform for speeds in excess of 1 Gbit/sec over longer distances.
FTM analysts project a major shift in the market by 2008, when, for the first time, fiber cabling shipments will exceed copper UTP cabling shipments. Copper has always dominated the market, but fiber cabling is expected to become the dominant cabling media for structured cabling system applications, such as data centers, campus, and Fiber-to-the-Zone (FTTZ). In addition, fiber cabling will continue to be the dominant cabling used in riser cabling subsystems.
That said, FTM projects that copper UTP cabling will continue to dominate the horizontal cabling subsystem market in the future. Fiber-to-the-Desk (FTTD) will remain illusive, being a small percentage of the total horizontal cabling subsystem market in the future. FTTD will be found mainly in niche applications, in which speeds of 10 Gbits/sec or higher are required at the workstations. For example, CAD or CAM terminals or any workstation handling a great deal of video feeds will be the typical application implementing FTTD in the future.
According to the study, fiber cabling shipments are forecast to grow from $1.2 billion in 2005 to $4 billion by 2010, a growth rate of 26.3%. The highest growth application is expected to be data centers.
This FTM Consulting study is part of the IGI Certified Report Series and provides detailed product forecasts segmented by applications, by Gigabit Ethernet, and by type of cable (SM, MM, Cat 5, Cat 5e, Cat 6, etc.). For more information, visit Information Gatekeepers.