Asia Pacific wireless packet core market up 40%

Exact Ventures has released a report showing 40 percent growth for the wireless packet core market in the second quarter of this year compared with the same quarter last year. The growth is said to have been caused primarily from a huge increase in packet data serving node (PDSN) shipments to CDMA operators in Asia Pacific, such as MTS in India, and to a lesser extent, large North American CDMA-based operators, such as Verizon Wireless and Sprint.

The report indicated growth for the nascent evolved packet core (EPC) market temporarily slowed in the second quarter; however, it is expected to take off in the second half of the year due to scheduled EPC network launches.

"Wireless packet core equipment is critical for operators to develop revenue generating applications and services that differentiate network traffic content," stated Greg Collins, founder and principal analyst at Exact Ventures.

To meet the operator demands, vendors are tasked with providing network equipment that can scale with the tremendous increases in data and signaling traffic as well as provide intelligent and management functionality to help them to develop their own applications in order to grow revenues and differentiate their services," added Collins.

During the quarter, Ericsson and Nokia Siemens gained share due to seasonal strength, while ZTE gained share on strong shipments, especially PDSN shipments, to India.

Exact Venture's Wireless Packet Core (WPC) Quarterly Report includes coverage of legacy WPC and Evolved Packet Core (EPC) markets. Specific coverage includes revenues, shipments and pricing by vendor, as well as a market-level forecast for the Gateway GPRS Support Node (GGSN) Serving GPRS Support Node (SGSN), Packet Data Serving Node (PDSN), ASN Gateway, Mobility Management Entity (MME), Serving Gateway (SGW), Packet Data Node (PDN) Gateway, and Policy Charging and Rules Function (PCRF) markets.