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Demand for Fiber-Optic Broadband Services at Home

Telecom and Cable TV broadband service providers have continued to invest in their infrastructure during 2013. Broadband customer premise equipment (CPE) shipments at the end of 2013 were expected to surpass 147 million units, according to the latest global market study by ABI Research.

The CPE devices counted include broadband modems, wired routers, and home gateways. Despite a growing broadband subscriber base and increasing demand for advanced broadband services, broadband CPE shipments are only expected to grow to 150 million in 2014.

"Increasing adoption of fiber-optic broadband services is driving the growth of fiber-optic CPE shipments," said Jake Saunders, VP and practice director at ABI Research.

Fiber-optic CPE will represent 26 percent of overall broadband CPE shipped in 2014. Cable and DSL CPE devices will have equal market share of around 37 percent.

As cable broadband operators rapidly extend to DOCSIS 3.0 networks, related DOCSIS CPE shipment is gaining market share. In 2014, DOCSIS 3.0 CPE devices shipped will reach 50 million, accounting for more than 89 percent of cable CPE shipments.

Total DSL CPE shipments by the end of 2013 are likely to be around 2 percent lower than total shipments in 2012 -- mainly due to slow subscriber net addition in DSL broadband service.

However, since DSL operators continue to upgrade to higher speed VDSL services, VDSL CPE shipments are growing stronger. ABI Research expects that VDSL CPE will account for over 25 percent of DSL CPE device shipments in 2014.

ZTE tops broadband CPE shipments in the third quarter 2013, with a 13 percent market share. ARRIS jumped to second place after acquiring the Motorola business unit in April 2013.

Combined shipments of ARRIS and Motorola CPE represents 12 percent market share, overtaking Huawei which owns 11 percent market share.

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