Cisco has released its annual "Visual Networking Index," the company's ongoing analysis covering the worldwide growth and use of IP networks worldwide. In addition to updates to its standard forecast for 2011-2016, Cisco has added a complementary study, the Cisco VNI Service Adoption Forecast, which includes projections for residential, consumer mobile and business services growth rates from 2011-2016.
MORE: Cisco: Global 'Net traffic to surpass 1 zettabyte in 2016
Among the updated top-level findings for the 2011 to 2016 study period:
• Global IP traffic will nearly quadruple from 2011 to 2016.
• The total number of fixed and mobile devices and connections on global networks will grow from 10.3 billion in 2011 to 18.9 billion by 2016 -- nearly doubling in only five years.
• The number of devices connected to IP networks will be nearly three times as high as the global population in 2016; the three networked devices per capita in 2016 is up from over one networked device per capita in 2011.
• Traffic from wireless devices will exceed traffic from wired devices by 2016. In 2016, wired devices will account for 39% of IP traffic, while Wi-Fi and mobile devices will account for 61% of IP traffic. In 2011, wired devices accounted for the majority of IP traffic at 55%.
• By 2016, the sum of all forms of video will exceed 86% of global consumer traffic; digital TV will the fastest-growing service across all residential service categories, while mobile video will be the fastest-growing consumer mobile service from 2011 to 2016.
• Business IP traffic will grow at a CAGR of 22% from 2011 to 2016; increased adoption of advanced video communications in the enterprise segment will cause business IP traffic to grow by a factor of three.
• Business videoconferencing will grow sixfold over the forecast period at a CAGR of 48% between 2011 and 2016. Desktop videoconferencing will be the fastest-growing service across all business service categories (mobile and fixed) for this period.
Cisco also provides complimentary access to its study, on a website compete with a modeling tool for the data, along with more specific results by region, by application, by market segment. Our thanks to Cisco for sharing one of the most valuable studies of the year.