IDC: Strong growth in enterprise WLAN market in the fourth quarter and full year 2021

According to IDC's Global WLAN Market Quarterly Tracking Report, the enterprise wireless LAN (WLAN) market continued to grow strongly in the fourth quarter of 2021 (4Q21), with revenue increasing 21.8% year-on-year to US$2.3 billion. For the full year, enterprise WLAN revenue increased 20.4% compared to 2020 to US$7.6 billion.

The consumer WLAN market declined 10.1% year-on-year in the quarter and 2.5% for the full year. The enterprise and consumer markets grew 3.0% in the quarter and 6.5% for the full year, with total revenue reaching $17.2 billion.

Growth in the enterprise WLAN market continues to be driven by the latest Wi-Fi standard, Wi-Fi 6 or 802.11ax. Wi-Fi 6 access points accounted for 75.1% of the dependent access point (AP) segment revenue and 61.3% of shipments. Wi-Fi 5 access points, also known as 802.11ac, accounted for most of the remaining share.

Meanwhile, the decline in the consumer WLAN market is mainly due to the difficulty in comparing it to the strong performance in 2020, when consumers upgraded their wireless network connections in response to the pandemic. Compared with the full year of 2019 before the pandemic, the consumer market grew 12.6% in 2021, indicating that the market fundamentals remain strong. Wi-Fi 6 products continued to grow in the consumer market, accounting for 28.2% of the total revenue and 13.1% of the shipments in the consumer market. Wi-Fi 5 APs still account for the majority of revenue and shipments, at 61.4% and 63.6%, respectively.

"The enterprise WLAN market continued its steady rebound in the fourth quarter of 2021, driving significant annual growth for the full year 2021," said Brandon Butler, research manager, Network Infrastructure at IDC. "This shows that organizations around the world are reinvesting in their connectivity strategies and prioritizing wireless access in their LANs as a key part of their digital transformation goals."

From a regional perspective, the enterprise WLAN market has grown in most parts of the world, with the Chinese market being particularly strong, with a year-on-year growth of 50.5% in the fourth quarter and a full-year growth of 47.2%. In the Asia-Pacific region excluding China and Japan, the quarterly growth was 20.9% and the full-year growth was 16.0%. Japan declined by 21.1% in the quarter.

The US enterprise WLAN market grew 15.4% in the quarter and 14.6% for the full year. The Canadian market grew 11.1%, and the Latin American market grew 23.6% and 33.0% for the full year. Western Europe grew 33.9% in the quarter and 22.9% for the full year; Central and Eastern Europe grew 7.5% and 10.6% for the full year. The Middle East and Africa grew 4.8% and 6.6% for the full year.

"The enterprise WLAN market experienced strong growth in most regions of the world this quarter, driving full-year growth in most regions," said Petr Jirovsky, research director for IDC's Worldwide Network Trackers. "The enterprise WLAN market has maintained healthy growth compared to the peak of the pandemic in 2020, indicating that organizations have resumed spending on wireless network infrastructure."

Cisco's enterprise WLAN revenue grew 22.1% year-over-year in the quarter and 14.2% for the full year, with a market share of 40.5% in 2021, slightly lower than 42.7% in 2020.

HPE-Aruba grew 9.9% year-over-year in the fourth quarter and 14.0% for the full year, with a market share of 12.8% in 2021, slightly lower than 13.5% in 2020.

Ubiquiti's enterprise WLAN revenue decreased 3.3% year-over-year in the fourth quarter, but increased 14.7% for the full year, with a market share of 8.0% in 2021.

Huawei's enterprise WLAN revenue in the fourth quarter increased by 48.0% year-on-year, and increased by 44.4% for the full year, with a market share of 7.4% in 2021, up from 6.2% in 2020.

H3C's revenue grew 41.8% in the fourth quarter and 33.7% for the full year, with a full-year market share of 4.8%, higher than 4.3% in 2020.