PCS Fuels Wireless Infrastructure Market to Over 60 Percent Growth in 1996, According to Dataquest

Lucent Maintains Lead, but Northern Telecom Posts Strongest Growth

San Jose, Calif., June 4, 1997—Due to spectacular growth in personal communications services (PCS) spending in infrastructure, the United States wireless infrastructure market grew 63 percent, to $5.3 billion in 1996, up from $3.3 billion in 1995, according to Dataquest. PCS spending increased from $530 million in 1995 to $2.8 billion in 1996. Despite the health of the overall wireless infrastructure market, the cellular infrastructure market saw negative growth.

"PCS carriers built their networks fast and furiously in 1996, but 1997 should be even better," said Clint McClellan, industry analyst for Dataquest's Personal Communications program. "Northern Telecom gained the most in this buildout as it was the only company to win sizable contracts for CDMA and PCS-1900 technologies."

Lucent Technologies held its lead in the U.S. market in both cellular and PCS, but Northern Telecom showed the strongest growth with over 100 percent growth. Ericsson and Motorola posted steady cellular and PCS growth, but lost market share due to Northern Telecom's tenacity in winning PCS contracts (see Table 1). However, Ericsson and Motorola are well poised for global growth as each have larger installed bases than Lucent Northern Telecom internationally.

Table 1
Total United States Infrastructure Market (Cellular and PCS)

Company                       1995 Market      1996 Market         1996
                               Share (%)        Share (%)        Growth(%)
Lucent Technologies                36.2             37.2            68.2
Ericsson                           28.0             23.2            35.9
Motorola CIG                       19.8             14.5            20.3
Northern Telecom                   15.3             19.2           104.8
Nokia                                 -              3.7               -
QUALCOMM                              -              1.5               -
Others                              0.8              0.6            25.9
Total Market                      100.0            100.0            63.4
Source: Dataquest (June 1997)

Additional information about the U.S. wireless infrastructure market is available in the Dataquest Market Statistics Report titled "Personal Communications Services and Equipment Market Share." [ http://gartner5.gartnerweb.com/ggbin/ggshowdoc?open=dq@persnams9701.html ] This Report provides complete market share information for the past two years by technology on the entire wireless industry.

To purchase this Report or subscribe to Dataquest's Personal Communications program, please call 800-419-DATA. More information about Dataquest's programs, descriptions of recent research reports, and full text of press releases can be found on the Internet at http://www.dataquest.com.

Dataquest, founded in 1971, is a global market research and consulting company serving the high-technology and financial communities. The company provides worldwide market coverage on the semiconductor, computer systems and peripherals, communications, document management, software, and services sectors of the information technology industry. Dataquest is a GartnerGroup [ http://gartner5.gartnerweb.com/public/static/home/home.html ] Company.