Global broadband access equipment sales dropped 15% in the first quarter to $2.5 billion, according to data just published by Dell’Oro Group.
The news was even worse in the “cable access concentrator” market, where revenue declined 22% year over year to $211 million.
Dell’Oro blamed a slowdown in license sales for converged cable access platform (CCAP) in North America for the cable sector hit. More broadly, the research company said supply chain disruption in the Asia-Pacific region, caused by the COVID-19 pandemic, affected the global broadband access industry.
Drilling down further in Dell’Oro Group’s Broadband Access and Home Networking Quarterly Report , the pandemic also affected markets like PON ONT (optical network terminal), which saw a 15% revenue drop with fiber-to-the-home buildups stalled in Q1
“The first half of 2020 will give way to a sustained rebound in broadband equipment spending in the second half of the year,” said Jeff Heynen, senior research director for broadband access and home networking at Dell’Oro Group, in a statement. “The need to expand residential broadband speeds and availability will ultimately win out over the current macroeconomic slowdown.”
The good news for cable access equipment vendors is that shipments of DOCSIS 3.1 customer premises equipment (CPE) increased to 5.8 million and now represent 67% of cable CPE shipments.
