A recently published report by Dell’Oro Group reveals that Radio Access Network (RAN) market conditions remain challenging, with global RAN revenues declining at a double-digit rate year-over-year for a fourth consecutive quarter. At the same time, pockets of the market are performing better, with three out of the six tracked regions growing, up from one region in the first quarter of 2024.
Dell’Oro Group’s RAN Quarterly Report offers a complete overview of the RAN industry, with tables covering manufacturers’ and market revenue for multiple RAN segments, including 5G NR Sub-7 GHz, 5G NR mmWave, LTE, macro base stations and radios, small cells, Massive MIMO, Open RAN, and vRAN. The report also tracks the RAN market by region and includes a four-quarter outlook. Highlights from the report include:
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Total RAN revenues were mostly in line with expectations;
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Strong growth in North America and stable trends in China were not enough to offset steep declines in the Asia Pacific region, partly driven by sharp drops in India;
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Vendor rankings are mostly unchanged. The top 5 RAN suppliers based on worldwide revenues are Huawei, Ericsson, Nokia, ZTE, and Samsung;
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Relative to 2023, Huawei’s 1H 2024 revenue share is up, ZTE is stable, and Nokia/Ericsson are together down 3 to 4 percentage points; and
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Short-term RAN projections are mostly unchanged since the 5-year forecast update. Global RAN is expected to decline 8% to 12% outside of China.
“Even if the RAN market is still down at a double-digit rate in the first half, the second quarter offered some glimmer of hope that the nadir of this cycle with double-digit declines might now be in the past for the time being,” said Stefan Pongratz, Vice President and analyst at the Dell’Oro Group. “This does not change the fact that the RAN market is expected to decline at a 2% CAGR over the next five years. But the pace of the decline should moderate somewhat going forward.”
