Study: Foundry Networks Leads 10-Gigabit Ethernet Market

Foundry Networks has the largest market share in the 10-Gigabit Ethernet (10-GbE) Layer 3 market, according to a study by the Dell'Oro Group.

As the Layer 3 10-GbE switch market has grown, Foundry has been able to grab a 45% share of port shipments and a 42.6% share of market revenue in the third quarter of 2004, says the report. This was a dramatic jump over the company's second quarter numbers of 35% of port shipments and 3% of revenues. According to Dell'Oro, the 10-GbE market has grown as port prices have fallen and enterprises seek to future-proof their bandwidth needs.

Foundry has been an energetic player in the space in its efforts to drive 10-GbE technology into the networking mainstream. According to Dell'Oro, it was the leading 10-GbE solution provider in 2003, and has been the undisputed champion of Layer 3 10-GbE modular solutions for the last six quarters. With the release of its FastIron Edge X-Series switches in the second quarter of this year, Foundry has also been the top vendor in the Layer 3 10-GbE fixed category.

"Foundry has been leading the adoption of 10-Gigabit Ethernet since 2001 by delivering the industry's most complete and flexible 10-Gigabit Ethernet solutions at compelling price points," Foundry Chairman and CEO Bobby Johnson said in a statement. "Our strategy is to offer the broadest and most diverse portfolio of 10-GbE products for edge, backbone and data centers, providing our customers in both enterprise and service provider environments scalable, flexible, cost-effective 10-GbE solutions."

The company reinforced that strategy with its release earlier this month of a wide array of 10-GbE products at prices as low as $2,500 per port. At the same time, Foundry announced what it calls the industry's first 10-GbE wide-area network physical layer optical transceiver as a lower-cost, Ethernet-based alternative to SONET/OC-192 fiber optic networks.