Did hosted PBX sales take a sharp jump in 2009? That seems to be what the Telecommunications Industry Association believes. The TIA notes a “steep decline in the PBX market in 2009” attributable to a big pickup in buying of hosted services instead. That might not be the most reasonable explanation, though.
Given the “Great Recession” of 2008, the easiest explanation is simply that buyers put their plans on hold.
TIA expects the PBX market to continue to expand, but at moderating rates from 2011. Growth of about five percent annually during the next two years is what TIA expects, with growth dropping to four percent in 2014, and to 3.8 percent in 2015.
For the forecast period as a whole, growth will average 4.7 percent compounded annually to $5.4 billion in 2015 from $4.5 billion in 2011.
Growth in the PBX market is being driven by SMBs, the report also suggests. SMBs accounted for approximately half the lines sold in 2011, TIA says. In part, that is because suppliers such as Cisco and Avaya now offer small IP PBX systems targeted to SMBs.
As recently as 2009, Cisco and Avaya did not offer small IP PBXs, although they were the leading sellers of large IP PBXs overall.
Still, the TIA report does note that cloud-based platforms have the potential to replace premises based systems, particularly for SMBs, though not offering any specific forecasts.