The Bandwidth Glut is Over

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Following several rough years, the global bandwidth market is showing signs of improved health: supply equilibrium, price stability, and competitor consolidation. Persistent international bandwidth demand growth has depleted inventories of unsold circuits on many submarine cables and on some segments of terrestrial networks. This has led many network operators, including VSNL, FLAG Telecom, Asia Netcom, and Telefonica, among others, to light additional wavelengths and fiber pairs on an as-needed basis. This incremental approach to managing spare circuit inventories means that lit bandwidth supply and bandwidth demand are coming into balance.

This doesn't mean a network construction boom is pending. Instead, operators will need to make more of what they already have -- most of the potential capacity in fiber networks remains untapped. By the end of 2006 little more than 14 percent of the potential capacity on major submarine cables will be lit.

TeleGeography's global Bandwidth Research Service

Publ 20060420