Eighty percent of telecom wholesalers expect near-term revenue growth

BOSTON, USA: The worldwide telecom wholesale market is on the rebound, with 80 percent of all wholesalers saying they expect a healthy uptick in revenue over the next two years. That’s in stark contrast with a decade ago, when the global wholesale market was imploding and pessimism reigned.

In “2010 Smart Wholesale Survey: Renaissance Dawns,” a new Yankee Group report based on a global survey of 240 wholesale decision-makers conducted in conjunction with Capacity magazine, the renewed vigor is due to optimism around mobility, cloud computing and content services.

Key findings include:
* Wholesale is garnering board-level attention: More than a third of survey respondents strongly agree that wholesale is becoming more strategically important to their parent company’s management.
* Cloud computing is moving to prime time: Data centers are the No. 1 capex priority for wholesalers, presaging a major move into cloud service provision.
* Asia and CEE are the hot spots: Asian wholesale is expected to grow fastest, but Central and Eastern Europe (CEE) narrowly outpaces the Middle East and Africa for second place in regional growth expectations.

“This survey indicates wholesalers feel they’ve overcome the irrational exuberance of the Enron era, and a vibrant cloud era is dawning,” said Camille Mendler, VP and senior research fellow at Yankee Group and author of the report. “To stay on top of this rebounding market, however, wholesalers need to make smart decisions and avoid ‘drunken sailor’ pricing as these new services evolve.”