RHK also found that considerable consolidation is occurring in the carrier market as smaller companies, unable to compete, go out of business. Revenues-per-bit fell 45% in 2001, mainly due to intense price pressure, better utilisation of higher bandwidth pipes by enterprise customers and declines in the wholesale dial-up business as users migrate to broadband access.
“Although traffic growth is still strong, it is growing at a less extreme pace than in earlier years, suggesting the internet is following the usual curve for any maturing market,” says Muayyad Al-Chalabi, director of RHKÂ’s Executive Strategic Partnership programme. “The boom and bust of the dot-com era generated myths and unattainable expectations. It is important to have a realistic understanding of growth patterns, as they provide the best indication of the size of tomorrowÂ’s networks.”
