LEADERBOARD expands to nine; Ports grew more than 20 percent in 2015

BOSTON, MA, FEBRUARY 25, 2016 – Vertical Systems Group announces its U.S. Carrier Ethernet LEADERBOARD results for year-end 2015. The following companies achieved LEADERBOARD status (rank order based on retail port share): AT&T, Level 3, Verizon, CenturyLink, Time Warner Cable, Comcast, Cox, XO and new entrant Windstream.

To qualify for the LEADERBOARD, providers must have four percent (4%) or more of the U.S. Ethernet services market. Shares are measured by number of ports in service at businesses and enterprises as tracked by Vertical, with input from surveys of Ethernet providers.

“For the full year 2015, the Ethernet market grew by more than 20 percent, however the second half of the year showed moderating growth going into 2016,” said Rick Malone, principal at Vertical Systems Group. “During this cycle, Windstream moved up to the LEADERBOARD from the Challenge Tier based on the strength of its Ethernet private line service and its presence in many smaller markets that others do not serve.”

• Ethernet providers cited footprint expansion and support for increased speeds as their top initiatives for 2016 in response to Vertical Systems Group’s Year-End 2015 Ethernet/IP VPN/Fiber and LEADERBOARD Survey. Price compression and provisioning intervals are considered the primary challenges.
• A key competitive requirement cited by Ethernet providers is MEF CE 2.0 certification. Seven of the nine companies on the 2015 U.S. LEADERBOARD have MEF CE 2.0 certified services. Additionally, all LEADERBOARD-ranked companies employ MEF Carrier Ethernet Certified Professionals (MEF-CECPs).

Other providers selling Ethernet services in the U.S. are segmented into two tiers as measured by port share. The first or Challenge Tier includes providers with between 1% and 4% share of the U.S. retail Ethernet market. For 2015, the following five companies attained a position in the Challenge tier (in alphabetical order): Bright House, Charter, Cogent, Lightpath and Zayo.

The second or Market Player tier includes all providers with port share below 1%. Companies in the Market Player tier include the following providers (in alphabetical order): Alpheus Communications, American Telesis, Birch Communications, BT Global Services, Cincinnati Bell, Consolidated Communications, Earthlink Business, Expedient, FairPoint, FiberLight, Frontier, Global Cloud Xchange, GTT, Hawaiian Telecom, Integra, Lightower, LS Networks, Lumos Networks, Masergy, MegaPath, NTT America, Orange Business, RCN Business, Sprint, Suddenlink (Altice), Tata, TDS Telecom, TelePacific, Telstra, Unite Private Networks, US Signal, WOW!Business and other companies selling retail Ethernet services in the U.S. market.

Detailed Ethernet share results for the U.S. market plus in-depth share analysis are available now exclusively through Vertical Systems Group’s ENS (Emerging Networks Service) Research Programs.