Networking biz in India grows by 25%

Goldie

MUMBAI: Networking business in the country has witnessed a healthy growth of 25 percent in the first three quarters of the current financial year as compared to a similar period last fiscal. While the network equipment business has recorded an estimated revenue growth of 20 percent, revenues from network integration has gone up by nearly 35 percent.

Most of the vendors have reported between 10 to 15 percent qoq growth and express confidence of closing the year with much better performance. Said Uday Birje, CEO, Enterasys Networks, "We expect to grow twice the market growth rate by the end of this fiscal."

Networking major Cisco, which posted a 21 percent growth last year, is expected to achieve at least 30 percent growth this fiscal. Explaining the reason behind this growth, Manoj Chugh, President-India and SAARC, Cisco Systems said, "Corporate across all segments -- public sector banks, government and service providers, have realized that reliable network is a key driver of profitability."

D-Link too has reported a 15 percent q-on-q growth while Accton reports of a 30 percent qoq growth. Select Technologies (now a part of WeP) also informed of a 25 percent quarterly growth.

Network integrators have reported a far better growth in their business. Most of them are confident of posting between 30 and 40 percent year-on-year growth by the time fiscal ends. The growth has been largely attributed to corporate decision cycles getting shorter, increased pro-activity from government and education sector and a rapidly growing telecom market.

While the demand for regular networking equipment like switches, routers, hubs and NICs has been steadily going up, their prices too have been falling down. The most significant price is happening in switches, especially the low-end unmanaged kind. This, they argue, is to take away the market share that hubs currently enjoy.