Next-generation Wi-Fi products make up a small but growing segment of the market, according to a new report by ABI Research.
Devices with the 802.11ac standard began entering the market in late 2012, ABI said, and a total of 0.2 million 802.11ac access points shipped in the first quarter of this year. ABI expects that to increase to 1 million units by the end of this year.
“802.11n device shipments still dominate the market, accounting for more than two thirds of total device shipments; however, 802.11ac access point adoption is starting to gain traction,” says Jake Saunders, VP and practice director of forecasting at ABI.
The overall Wi-Fi market continues on a growth trend as well. ABI said that on a global basis, consumer Wi-Fi customer premises equipment shipments surpassed 43.3 million at the end of the first quarter of 2013, a 16.8% jump from the fourth quarter of 2012. The IEEE approved a new 802.11ad standard earlier this year which uses the 60 GHz band (WiGig), and products built to that standard are expected to enter the market around the end of this year, ABI said.
In other Wi-Fi news this week, Boingo Wireless announced the official launch of App Download, an advertising option that allows brands to reward users with free Wi-Fi access in exchange for downloads of their mobile apps.
Boingo said that more than a dozen brands have running multi-week campaigns with App Download, which verifies that a user has downloaded an iOS or Android app before providing the free network access. The company said that in initial campaigns, hundreds of thousands of installations have occurred, with up to 20% of the connecting users in some locations taking advantage of the free Wi-Fi offer.
