The roster of service providers on Vertical Systems Group’s (VSG) SD-WAN Leaderboard has expanded to nine, but the leader remains AT&T for the fifth consecutive year, the analysts firm says.
The companies, all of which have at least 2% of the installed and billable carrier managed customer sites in the U.S. as of the end of last year are (in order of site share) AT&T, Comcast Business, Verizon, Hughes, Lumen, Windstream, TPx, Zayo and Aryaka.
“The managed SD-WAN market broadened significantly in 2022, with businesses and enterprises of all sizes transitioning away from legacy services,” Vertical Systems Group principal Rick Malone said in a press release. “Increased competition led to market share gains for Challenge Tier and Market Player companies.”
The Challenger Tier – companies with between 1% and 2% of sites (in alphabetical order) – were Cox Business, Fusion Connect, MetTel, Comcast’s Spectrum Enterprise and T-Mobile.
Highlights of the research:
- Leaderboard positions shifted for three companies compared to last year and the number of providers on the list increased from seven to nine.
- Verizon moved to third position from fourth and Hughes moves into fourth position from third.
- TPx advances from the Challenge Tier to the seventh position on the top tier.
- Zayo debuts in eighth position on the top tier with sites from its QOS Networks acquisition, moving up from the Market Player tier.
- Aryaka drops into the ninth and final position in the top tier from seventh.
- The 2022 Challenge Tier increased from three to five companies as Cox Business, Comcast Spectrum Enterprise and T-Mobile moved from the Market Player tier.
- Challenges for 2023 cited by SD-WAN service providers include managing security integration with evolving secure access service edge and security service edge (SASE and SSE) solutions.
- Five of the Leaderboard companies have attained MEF 3.0 SD-WAN Service Certification: AT&T, Comcast Business, Verizon, Lumen and Windstream.
The Market Player category has less than 1% of the market. A non-exhaustive, alphabetized list includes AireSpring, Alta Fiber, American Telesis, Arelion, Astound Business, Bigleaf, BT Global Services, C Spire Business, CentraCom, Cogent, Colt, Consolidated Communications, Crown Castle, DQE Communications, First Digital, FirstLight, Flo Networks, Frontier, Great Plains Communication, GTT, InfoStructure, Intelsat, Lightpath, Logix Fiber Networks, Meriplex, Momentum Telecom, NTT, Orange Business, PCCW Global, PS Lightwave, SDN Communications, Segra, SES, Shentel Business, SingTel, Sparklight Business, Syringa, T-Systems, Tata, Telefonica, Telstra, Unite Private Networks, Uniti, Virgin Media Business, Vodafone and Ziply Fiber.
Year-end 2021 Leaderboard firms were, in order, AT&T, Comcast Business, Hughes, Verizon, Lumen, Windstream and Aryaka. Year end 2020 finishers were AT&T, Hughes, Verizon, Comcast, Windstream, Lumen, Aryaka and TPx.
