In-Stat sees sharp upturn in cell base station market

July 5, 2005

After several tough years, the market for macro cellular base stations will increase sharply from 1.8 million in 2004 to 3.5 million in 2009, reports In-Stat. The number of new base stations sold each year will not be consistent, though, with the number bumping up and down depending on which technologies are being deployed and where, the high-tech market research firm says.

A combination of new technology, base station upgrades, and increases in needed capacity will drive the cellular base station market. While prices for infrastructure equipment continue to drop, the efficiency of the equipment increases, so less equipment is needed to handle a given number of subscribers. Still, increases in base station efficiency cannot keep up with the ever-increasing number of subscribers.

A recent report by In-Stat found the following:

- In some cases, in the last five years, base station prices have dropped by a factor of 10.

- The number of worldwide cellular subscribers will hit 2.6 billion in 2009, up from 1.6 billion in 2004.

- Carriers around the world are eagerly upgrading their equipment to support new high-speed data technologies (GPRS, EDGE, CDMA2000 EV-DO).