The wireless-local-area-network (WLAN) market saw continuous growth throughout 2013, which bodes well for this year. According to a new report from Dell’Oro Group, the market grew 9% in the fourth quarter of 2013 compared to the previous quarter. Chris DePuy, the Dell’Oro Group’s Vice President of Wireless LAN research, notes that 10% of total enterprise-class access points were from IEEE 802.11ac unit shipments. The research group predicts that IEEE 802.11ac devices like smartphone and tablets will continue to grow significantly in 2014—causing a necessary upgrade to wireless infrastructure.
While such studies usually identify top players in the market, one company did not stand out alone in terms of dollar share. Rather, shares fluctuated in the enterprise-class market segment among challengers including Juniper Networks, Meru Networks, Motorola Solutions, and Ruckus Wireless. In the enterprise-class and outdoor-mesh-nodes category, the top three vendors were Cisco Systems, Aruba Networks, and Ruckus Wireless for the fourth quarter of 2013. Total WLAN revenues for last year were $8.5 billion.