Free Report Download

Joel Stradling
Senior Analyst, Telecom Services Europe

July 19, 2006

Pan-European service providers are reacting at varying rates to growing market demand for carrier Ethernet services, which is driven by customer perception that such services offer, among other things, lower-cost access for higher bandwidth and flexible bandwidth scalability. Early movers, such as COLT and Interoute, already sell defined and MEF-certified products, while some other carriers, such as BT Global Services, lag just behind these companies by failing to communicate a clearly defined Ethernet portfolio (i.e., BT continues to sell a LAN/SAN Extension branded offer). Several operators, including Telecom Italia and Orange Business Services, are able to offer robust Ethernet services in their home markets, but these offers tend to scale far less effectively to cover several cities and towns in more than one country across Europe. Why are alternative players moving forward aggressively with productised WAN Ethernet offers? How should the incumbents react to this activity, and are currently available Ethernet WAN services meeting customer expectations?

Read more...