Tech research firm Ovum is forecasting telecom capital expenditures over the next five years will top $2 trillion.
In the United States, Ovum tallied some $364 billion in capex this year with mobile operators accounting for 59% of that spending and fixed-communications service providers making up the difference.
“CSPs have invested fairly heavily in 2013-14 across both fixed and mobile networks to support broadband rollouts,” Ovum report author and network infrastructure analyst Matt Walker said in a statement.
“But,” he continued, “this capacity will be absorbed, and technology and feature upgrades will drive capex back up to about $345 (billion annually) by 2019. Over the entire 2014-19 forecast period, CSP capex will total over $2 trillion.”
Ovum expects flat capital expenditure growth in 2015, noting “The years 2016 and 2017 are likely to be weak capex-wise for both fixed and mobile segments. We expect a modest recovery in 2018-19 as a new wave of fixed broadband, fixed cloud/data center and mobile broadband upgrades start rolling out in a number of large markets.”
Walker continued: “While CSP capex is tightly constrained, adjacent markets are starting to invest heavily in networks. Internet content provider capex will reach nearly $57 (billion) in 2014, up from $18.3 (billion) five years ago.”
“We expect network capex from the ICPs — which include Google, Apple, Facebook, Alibaba and many others — to continue growing over the next few years. These providers represent an attractive growth market opportunity for vendors selling technology.”
Ovum draws on some 180 analysts from around the world and provides industry insights on fields including IT, telecom and media.
