Of this total well over half of the spending will be on microwave equipment, according to Richard Webb, directing analyst for microwave and mobile offload at Infonetics Research.
By 2016 Infonetics projects that the macrocell mobile backhaul equipment market will grow to $9.7 billion. Of this equipment 94% is forecast to be spent on IP/Ethernet gear and a total of 54% of this on packet capable microwave.
As a result, Infonetics expects the Ethernet mobile backhaul router market to peak in 2015, when the build-out of macrocell mobile backhaul subsides and carriers focus on small cells.
“Steady, albeit slow, growth is in store for the macrocell mobile backhaul equipment market,” said Michael Howard, principal analyst and co-founder of Infonetics Research.
“While Verizon Wireless and AT&T are winding down their first big wave of LTE deployments and their spending is slowing, this is a large market and there’s still room for growth. We’re expecting a cumulative $43.6 billion to be spent on macrocell mobile backhaul equipment over the five years from 2012 to 2016, as operators outside of North America buy up microwave gear to support rising capacity requirements.”
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