Mobile backhaul needs to benefit cable co.'s

Cable operators are set to profit from the continued proliferation of wireless network upgrades and increased consumer demand for mobile services, according to a report from Visant Strategies.
The firm predicts that cable operator share of the mobile wireless backhaul market will surge more than five times by 2016, with cable operators scoring more than $3 billion in annual backhaul service revenues by 2015.
“A strong mix of fiber, copper and microwave technologies are now being used for backhaul,” said Andy Fuertes of Visant Strategies, and co-author of the report “U.S. Mobile Wireless Backhaul 2011: Cable joins Copper, Fiber and Microwave to meet Edge and Middle Network Needs.” “But mobile wireless operators have to look for more means to obtain higher backhaul capacities and quickly in some cases. Cable operators can offer needed backhaul at both the edge of the network, where the need is now, and in the middle network, where the need is in the very near future.”
Visant Strategies’ Larry Swasey added that consumer demand for increasingly data-hungry mobile services are fueling this backhaul need.
“U.S. mobile wireless operators are in the midst of serving a data-hungry audience,” said Swasey. “With 3.5G and 4G being deployed, wireless devices employing more capacity crunching apps and voice minutes going up, backhaul capacity in all areas of the network is a concern. Cable operators like microwave, fiber and copper vendors, will benefit from this concern.”