According to a new report by Synergy Research Group, the worldwide enterprise IP telephony equipment market grew 13.7 percent from the first to the second quarter of 2006. The market, which includes LAN telephony, pure IP telephony, IP phones, and the converged market, grew 53 percent from the same quarter last year.
A major catalyst was the increase in sales of IP phones, which saw a growth of 53 percent from a year ago and 23.8 percent from the first to the second quarter.
“IP Phone growth drove the quarter,” said Ryan Olsen, analyst at Synergy Research Group. “This significant growth was recognized by all the major players.”
Cisco leads the enterprise IP telephony market with 25.3 percent, just a hair above rival Avaya''s 25.2 percent market share. Cisco also had the largest quarter-to-quarter growth at 29 percent, and shipped over 1 million IP phones for the second quarter.
In second place, Avaya had its market share grow 14.7 percent, and shipped over 1 million converged lines. Nortel, which has struggled in recent years, maintained its third place position and grew its market share by 20.6 percent. Fourth-place Alcatel grew by 9.3 percent from the first to the second quarter.
In the United States, more and more businesses were switching to VoIP as enterprise IP telephony sales grew 31 percent in the second quarter. The Asia-Pacific region grew faster, at 39 percent, and the EMEA (Europe, the Middle East and Africa) grew at 25 percent.
According to Synergy Research Group, worldwide revenue for enterprise IP telephony was a shade under $ 1.2 billion. The research firm said it expects the market to hit $ 1.3 billion for the third quarter, and $ 5 billion for all of 2006.

Author: Marin Perez