CALIFORNIA, USA: The overall carrier router and switch market is up 21% year-over-year (3Q10 over 3Q09), find Infonetics Research in its latest study. The service provider router and switch market - including IP edge routers, IP core routers, carrier Ethernet switches (CES), and ATM switches - grew five percent from 2Q10 to 3Q10, to $3.3 billion worldwide, even as ATM switch sales continued to tank.

Also Read: Brocade launches Ethernet fabric switches

North America is helping lead the telecom world out of the economic doldrums, with EMEA coming along quickly, as evidenced by the carrier router and switch market.

The study finds that the North American IP edge and core router market is up 41 percent year-over-year.

"Cisco accounted for the largest part of the third quarter revenue upswing, and Alcatel-Lucent added solid quarterly gains, both driven by IP edge router sales. The third quarter bore good news, and we believe the fourth quarter will be even better,” predicts Michael Howard, co-founder and principal analyst for carrier and data center networks at Infonetics Research.

Cisco and Alcatel-Lucent posted double-digit percent sequential increases in carrier router revenue in 3Q10.

Huawei and Juniper also posted carrier router gains in 3Q10, with revenue up in the single-digit percents.