Despite Slow Uptake, Ethernet Exchanges Show Promise, Heavy Reading Finds

BOSTON, Feb. 27, 2013 /PRNewswire/ -- Ethernet exchanges (EEs) have come to market much slower than originally expected, but new prospects are emerging in new customer categories and modalities, according to the latest report from Heavy Reading Insider (www.heavyreading.com/insider), a subscription research service from Heavy Reading (www.heavyreading.com).

Ethernet Exchanges: A Market Concept Revisited examines the emergence of Ethernet exchanges, and their potential and promise in the market. It also touches on EE business models, new use cases and emerging applications. Finally, the report profiles four leading vendors in the market.

For a list of companies covered in this report, http://twimgs.com/audiencedevelopment/LRHR/PDFS/hri0213_companies.pdf

"Rapid development of the Ethernet services market by hundreds of providers worldwide left interconnectivity and interoperability central ongoing market issues as customers tried to connect beyond their own providers' coverage areas regionally, nationally and internationally," says Steve Koppman, research analyst with Heavy Reading Insider and author of the report. "The EEs that emerged in 2009-10 in response to these concerns were a trend that appears to much of the industry in 2013 to have promised much more than it delivered."

EEs were a new phenomenon in U.S. and worldwide Ethernet service markets, Koppman says. "They have, however, dramatically disappointed expectations in terms of take-up and business magnitude, though they appear to be growing again at this time," he continues. "But data center-based players are already starting to grow into software, as well as diversifying their appeal by market segment. Both models are likely to expand as their appeals become increasingly manifest to a broadening array of market participants."

Key findings of Ethernet Exchanges: A Market Concept Revisited include the following:

• Original EE providers have split into sharply contrasting business models of what they are providing and to which customer groups.
• Equinix and Telx continue with their data center-based EE model while shifting customer focus increasingly toward cloud and financial customers rather than carriers.
• CENX has shifted its focus to software development, primarily for wireless backhaul, and internal to carrier networks, which it still characterizes as squarely within its definition of the EE concept.
• Carriers still want crucially to maintain the unique attractions of their own services, while making them available ubiquitously beyond their service footprints.

Ethernet Exchanges: A Market Concept Revisited is available as part of an annual single-user subscription (12 issues) to Heavy Reading Insider, priced at $1,995. Individual reports are available for $900 (single-user license).

To subscribe, or for more information, please visit: www.heavyreading.com/insider. For more information about other Heavy Reading Insider research services, please visit: www.heavyreading.com/research.

To request a free executive summary of the report, or for details on multi-user licensing options, please contact:

Jeff Geddes
Account Manager
Heavy Reading
303-997-9135
jeff.geddes@ubm.com

Press/analyst contact:
Jennifer Baker
Marketing Director, Light Reading Communications Network
617-747-4110
jennifer.baker@ubm.com

About Heavy Reading (www.heavyreading.com)
Heavy Reading is an independent research organization offering deep analysis of emerging telecom trends to network operators, technology suppliers, and investors. Its product portfolio includes in-depth reports that address critical next-generation technology and service issues, market trackers that focus on the telecom industry's most critical technology sectors, exclusive worldwide surveys of network operator decision-makers that identify future purchasing and deployment plans, and a rich array of custom and consulting services that give clients the market intelligence needed to compete successfully in the global telecom industry. As a division of UBM Tech (tech.ubm.com), Heavy Reading contributes to the only integrated business information platform serving the global communications industry.

SOURCE Heavy Reading