Router roundup

The worldwide router market declined by as much as 32% in 2002, according to recently released market share data.

Synergy Research states that the worldwide market for routers dropped from $9.6 billion in 2001 to $6.6 billion in 2002, a decline of 32%. Meanwhile, Dell’Oro Group says the market fell 15%, to $6.1 billion in 2002 from $7.2 billion in 2001.

Dell’Oro cites the slowdown in service provider spending as the culprit behind the year-over-year decrease. Dell’Oro says that capital spending on wireline infrastructure fell 35% last year.

According to Synergy, the worldwide market for service provider edge and core routers dropped from $4.3 billion in 2001 to $2.8 billion in 2002, a decrease of 35%. Cisco’s share of this market rose from 64.6% to 70%, while rival Juniper’s dropped to 16.3% from 20.1% in that time, according to Synergy.

On a quarterly basis, Cisco’s share dropped from 72.9% in the third quarter 2002 to 69.6% in the fouth quarter, while Juniper rose from 19.7% to 20.8%.

Avici stayed flat at 2.2% quarter-to-quarter, while its year-over-year share advanced to 2.4% from 2.2%. In edge routers, Redback’s share fell to 1.6% from 3.3% between the third and fourth quarter, while its year-over-year share gained 2.4%, from 2.2% to 4.6%, according to Synergy.

The overall edge and core router market decreased 1% from the third to fourth quarter, from $640 million to $632 million, Synergy found.