Home Network Demand to Remain Steady

Sep 1, 2001 12:00 PM, By EC&M Staff

Among multiple-PC households, demand for network connectivity solutions remains steady, reports Parks Associates, a Dallas-based research firm.

According to a survey of 2,500 U.S. households, entitled, “Bundled Services and Residential Gateways,” these consumers are likely to seek home networking solutions that share Internet access and peripherals. A secondary driver for home networking includes entertainment applications.

“This latest batch of research helps us better understand the role of the early-adopter consumer and sheds new light on how home networking will evolve,” says Kurt Scherf, vice president of research for Parks Associates. “With a more detailed profile of the purchasers of home networking solutions, we are better able to build forecast models that we believe are more accurate in presenting the outlook for this market.”

The survey also reveals that a third of U.S. households subscribing to dial-up Internet service are interested in upgrading to broadband service in the next 12 months. Additionally, 28% of broadband subscribers intend to purchase home networking solutions in the same period.

This research supports previous forecasts compiled by Parks Associates, which predicted that 10.7 million U.S. households will subscribe to broadband service and 5.7 million households will have some form of home network deployed by year-end 2001.

The research firm estimates that as of the end of June 2001 there were 8.6 million U.S. households subscribing to broadband service. For more information, e-mail sales@parksassociates.com or call (972) 490-1113.