As 2008 winds down, it's a good time to reflect on some of the major networking trends of the past year. The three trends that matter most to small and midsize businesses: the emergence of new players in the cell phone market, the slow rollout of WiMax technology, and consolidation among network equipment suppliers.
The Changing Cell Phone Market
Just a few years ago, small and midsize businesses didn't need to worry much about their employees' cell phones. My, times have changed. As cell phones have gained more power and become more intelligent, they have become key business productivity tools, enabling employees to stay in contact with cohorts and customers. Rather than individual purchases, they have become corporate property.
In addition, their increasing functionality has begun to blur the lines between these products and laptops and forced businesses to manage the small devices proactively, something that many organizations are still struggling to accomplish.
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Looking beyond the growing use of smartphones, the profile of the top suppliers has also begun to shift. Nokia continues to reign supreme with a strong hold on the No. 1 position, but traditional foe Motorola has fallen on difficult times -- it needs a follow-up to the Razr ASAP. Korean suppliers Samsung and LG Electronics continue to gain traction. Fledgling entrants Apple and Google have turned traditional cell phone design upside down. Touch screens have become all the rage, and even Symbian has moved from a proprietary to an open source business model. Handheld devices are a dynamic area, one that could cause headaches for small and midsize business IT departments.
WiMax Market Slow To Take Shape
A couple of years ago, WiMax was viewed as the likely next-generation wireless broadband networking technology. However, Sprint, its main backer here in the United States, hit a few bumps and scaled back its deployment. Currently, the service is available only in Baltimore, and the company has shuffled its interest in WiMax off to Clearwire. The carrier has talked about rolling the service out in other places, but such plans are a bit tenuous at the moment.
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Competitors AT&T, T-Mobile, and Verizon have placed their bets on alternate 4G wireless technologies. The recent economic downturn has meant that carriers have to tighten their purse strings and made it less likely that they will invest in new technologies. Consequently, it appears WiMax will gain only minimal acceptance in the United States. For small and midsize businesses that could have benefited from increased competition among wireless broadband carriers, this is a negative development.
Last Networking Vendor Standing
Consolidation was a watchword during 2008. With market growth slowing down in many equipment sectors and Cisco casting a large shadow over the industry, many network equipment vendors have been struggling to survive. Quarterly earnings calls have featured a series of grim reports and pessimistic outlooks on the future.
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In response, there has been a great deal of shuffling among suppliers. To increase their girth, many have paired up. During the year, Enterasys bought controlling interest in Siemens' Enterprise Communications group, Brocade purchased Foundry Networks, HP acquired Colubris Networks, Belden purchased Trapeze Networks, and Aruba acquired AirWave Wireless. In addition, companies such as Avaya, 3Com, and Nortel have gone through various reorganizations -- with varying degrees of success -- in order to clean up their bottom lines and remain viable.
The challenge for small and midsize businesses is trying to determine where to place their bets. Do they stick with a struggling supplier and hope the company can continue to maneuver through turbulent waters? Do they jump to another company? Those are questions that many will have to answer in 2009.
See more columns by Paul Korzeniowski.
Paul Korzeniowski is a Sudbury, Mass.-based freelance writer who has been writing about networking issues for two decades. His work has appeared in Business 2.0, Entrepreneur, Investor's Business Daily, Newsweek, and InformationWeek.
