Global cloud-managed Wi-Fi infrastructure and managed services revenue is expected to reach $2.5bn by 2018, according to a report from the analysis firm International Data Corporation (IDC).

The cloud-managed Wi-Fi driven by the accelerating adoption across the midmarket and distributed enterprise is expected to reach $653m in 2014, the report revealed.

Growth of cloud-managed Wi-Fi is also spurred as the traditional worldwide enterprise wireless local area network (WLAN) market reached maturation level and has started to experience drop in gains for the past two years.

IDC Network Infrastructure vice president Rohit Mehra said enterprises are seeing the big picture and definitely considering cloud-managed Wi-Fi for their remote sites when upgrading their networks.

"These upgraded network architectures can accommodate unique needs around bring your own device (BYOD), scalability, application visibility and management," Mehra added.

According to the report, enterprises require wireless network for supporting BYOD and mission-critical network applications, which has spiked the growth of new wireless LAN deployments across various segments.

Cloud-managed Wi-Fi’s features such as central manageability, smaller physical footprint, and linear scalability make it a practical option for the enterprises, the report said.