Sales of equipment used to transport mobile traffic may have plateaued somewhat as LTE deployments near completion, but the need for backhaul isn't going away anytime soon -- and sales will likely climb back onto a growth track, reaching $45 billion worldwide by 2019.
A new IHS Infonetics report says that while macrocell mobile backhaul equipment revenue saw a slight decline in 2014, slipping 0.6 percent to $8.5 billion, demand for backhaul continued. Bandwidth requirements are steadily climbing, and 5G deployment is around the corner.
"While the market has experienced something of a plateau of late as many operators are approaching late-phase LTE deployment having already upgraded their backhaul, renewed growth is definitely on the horizon," said Richard Webb, research director for mobile backhaul and small cells at IHS. He added that India and other developing countries will be contributors to backhaul equipment sales. Release