Market Forecast by WAN Technology
Worldwide 1997 and 2000 Estimates
Sources: Vertical Systems Group 1997 and Data Comm 1998 Forecast
Notes:
Frame Relay and ATM are clearly the technologies seeing the greatest growth rates. Leased Line services are far and away the largest part for the WAN landscape for the foreseeable future. Customers are transitioning from traditional LL services to more cost effective and flexible solutions.
It is surprising to many how large X.25 service revenue continues to be. As with SNA, there are many applications (retail, banking, telephone billing systems) built with X.25 technology. U.S. X.25 growth rates are declining. Data Communications estimates X.25 service revenue to drop 8% between 1997 and 1998. No surprise, the decline has not been as rapid internationally, . The X.25 service revenue is expected to increase 1% from 1997 to 1998, down from 3% growth between 1996 and 1997.
Predictions for ATM are that it will pick up steam as we leave the 20th century. Customers and carriers alike have become more comfortable with ATM. The service providers have taken advantage of the cell switching technology in building their backbones. Offering Frame Relay to ATM Interworking makes a good transition to higher speed services for traditional Frame Relay customers needing higher central site bandwidth.
Data Sources: Vertical Systems Group ATM and Frame Relay Industry Update 1997, Data Communications Magazine 1998 Forecast.
Worldwide Year 2000 Leased Line and Year 2000 WW X.25 Forecasts were not available. Assumptions:
Vertical Systems Year 2000 LL US Rev $11.6B
WW assumed growth 3% on 15.593B=$16B WW $16B+ US$11.7B=$27.7B
Vertical Systems 1997 X.25 WW Revenue $2.7B assumed (-3%) growth =$2.6B
Data Comm X.25 US Revenue growth (-8%) 1997 to 1998, WW growth 1%