By Telecom Lead Team: The global optical networking (ON)
market grew to $15.59 billion in 2011, up 8 per cent from 2010.
In Q4 2011, the ON generated revenues of $4.2 billion,
the highest for the past three years.
The seasonal upswing was driven by strong results in the
Asia-Pacific and South and Central America (SCA) regions, up sequentially and
year over year to $5.6 billion and $1.1 billion, respectively, for 2011. EMEA
performed better than anticipated.
In our 3Q11 report we noted that results in China were
likely to play a big role in whether the year ended in a bang or a whimper, and
it appears we got sizzle not fizzle from China in 4Q11,” said Dana Cooperson,
vice president of Ovum’s network infrastructure practice.
North American spending fell back sequentially and y-o-y
in Q4 2011, to finish the year down to over $4.0 billion in total.
The biggest North American carriers turned off the
spending spigot at the end of the year, virtually wiping out market spending
gains from earlier in the year.
ZTE gained 1.8 share points in 2011 to go with the 3.3
share points it gained in 2010. ZTE has been steadily growing share and
continuing to solidify its third ranking, posting over 10 per cent share for
the first time in Q4 2011.
In 2012, Ovum expects ZTE to expand out of the product
segments and regions where it has been strongest. Metro WDM growth should be
the company’s ON strategic focus if it is to continue this run of prosperity.
Other share winners in 2011 included Ciena, FiberHome,
Cisco, NEC, Ericsson, and Fujitsu, in order of most to least gain. Based on
preliminary estimates, the most notable share gain is FiberHome as it joins the
top 10 ON vendors for the first time, relegating Tellabs to 11th rank.
Market leaders Huawei and Alcatel-Lucent topped the list
of share losers for the year.
Despite their performances this quarter, we can see that
Alcatel-Lucent is pushing its leading 100G position and its integrated OTN
solution hard to gain ground. Also we expect Huawei to come out strong in 2012
with its newly-available 100G, as it did with 40G in 2009,” Cooperson added.
