Sales of Shared Hubs and LAN Switches grew 4% over the first quarter, to $2.2bn during the second quarter according to the research analysts the Dell’Oro Group. Port shipments were up 14% to 23 million ports, during the second quarter. According to the company Cisco Systems Inc continued to lead the market with second quarter revenues up 7% at $475m. 3Com Corp was second with sale up 8% at $386m with Bay Networks Inc showing the second fastest growth up 12% to $334m. Highest growth was IBM reporting sales up 29% at $72m. Cabletron Systems Inc, Fore Systems Inc, Xylan Inc and Madge Networks Inc all saw declining market share with Fore the hardest hit, dropping 18%. According to Dell’Oro, the quarter saw a split in the Ethernet LAN switch market with data center switches rapidly shifting to 100Mbps, while 10 Mbps is being relegated to the desktop. With the move to the desktop, hub vendors are stripping 10Mbps units of features in a bid that has cut prices dramatically.
