TechNavio says 5G, interoperability testing and outsourcing will impact global test market
The emergence of “5G,” greater need for interoperability testing and an increase in outsourcing are the top three emerging trends in the global test market for general-purpose test equipment, according to research firm TechNavio.
TechNavio concluded that the development of 5G as well as the need for test equipment that can be used to test a broad range of products and ensure interoperability, will boost the market to the tune of a compound annual growth rate of almost 5% per year until 2021. The general-purpose test equipment market, including oscilloscopes, spectrum analyzers, signal generators, power meters and other test equipment, is expected to reach $6.58 billion by 2021.
Technavio noted that “the progress in technologies from 2G to more advanced technologies such as LTE and LTE-A has created the demand for continuous maintenance and quality testing of frequency and spectrum. Various vendors outsource the quality testing to external entities to ensure enhanced quality of service for their customers.”
“GPTE vendors benefit from the outsourcing testing and maintenance of equipment since it opens up new avenues for revenue generation for them. The expansion of their core business offerings means a clear growth for the market,” says Anju Ajaykumar, lead analyst for test and measurement research at Technavio.
In other test news this week:
-Two carrier IPX subsidiaries are working to enable international voice over LTE interworking. KPN company iBasis and SK Telecom subsidiary SK Telink said that they supported the first successful commercial interconnection for international voice over LTE services over their respective IPX networks. The two companies said they “are preparing for a further smooth commercial rollout of VoLTE interworking to their subscribers in South Korea and the Netherlands respectively.”
–Spirent Communications is collaborating with Huawei, IBM, Infosys and Tech Mahindra on a framework for rapid and automated service deployment in virtual networks. The companies were part of the Joint Agile Development catalyst at the TM Forum event this week. Spirent focused its efforts on automated validation of virtualized network functions as they are instatiated and end-to-end service layer performance.
Spirent also said this week that its Spirent Federal subsidiary that focuses on navigation, timing and positioning will be opening up a new customer service center in Israel. The new location begins public operations today.
-Both Spirent and Ixia are using Teledyne LeCroy’s SierraNet T328 25/50/100GbE analyzer for protocol analysis to support their 25/50GE Consortium and 25/50/100GbE IEEE 802.3by protocol analysis requirements, according to Teledyne LeCroy — which noted that while both companies specialize in source generation tools for virtual and physical network testing, they still needed protocol analyzers to assess the resulting Ethernet traffic.
–LitePoint’s IQxstream cellular test system won approval from Qualcomm to be used for testing its small cell cellular chipsets.
–Averna is partnering with test company MaxEye to add infotainment testing in the form of full digital and audio testing support to Averna’s AST-1000 signal tester.
-Fairview Microwave launched a new line of 1.0 millimeter cables that operate up to 100 GHz, for vector network analyzer testing, semiconductor probe testing and other test applications for millimeter wave and microwave radios.
–Berkeley Nucleonics recently won a contract for precise timing equipment with Canadian research and teaching institute Polytechnique Montreal.
–Tektronix has updated its IsoVu system for isolated power measurements, introducing half a dozen new models that will start shipping late in the third quarter.
–Grandstream Networks is looking for beta testers for its new long-range Wi-Fi access points. The company will have 80 units ready to go in mid-June and is seeking testers who have hands-on experience with deploying Wi-Fi networks. The outdoor, weather-proof APs supprot 802.11ac Wave 2 features including multi-user multiple-input-multiple-output and beam forming, and Grandstream says they can serve up throughput rates of up to 1.27Gbps over a 275-meter coverag range. The APs also have an embedded controller that allows that to automatically discover, provision and maange up to 30 other APs. More information available here.Â
–The Broadband Forum said that it is making progress on projects, including “5G” use cases such as “hybrid wireless/wireline networking in access and home networking, network slicing and projects for backhaul and fronthaul transport.” The group also has approved its TR-390 specification for standardized mechanisms for performance measurement.
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