The National Association of Electrical Distributors (NAED; www.naed.org) recently released the results of the 2003 TED Magazine voice/data products survey. The survey examines current distributor involvement in this product area, and compares the 2003 results to similar studies conducted in 1999, 2000, and 2001. The survey also quantifies top manufacturer lines in some product categories.
The 2003 results show that the percentage of distributors currently selling voice/data products has swung back up to 81% after a dip to 68% in 2001. The departure of many early adopters and the slowdown in the economy are among the factors that account for this fluctuation, says Branton White, NAED senior director of marketing.
Survey results indicate that fewer distributors are new to voice/data. The number of distributors that have handled voice/data products for one year or less has fallen to about 5%. Meanwhile, the number of distributors that have been selling voice/data products for five years or longer is holding fairly steady after a sharp jump in 2000.
Also, 81% of surveyed distributors expect voice/data sales to increase over the next two years, with an average expected increase of 30%.
More than 60% of distributors have at least one voice/data specialist on staff, up from 53% in 2000. The average number of specialists rose from 2 to 2.4. Additionally, more than 75% of distributors now offer voice/data training programs to their customers. That number is up from slightly over 50% in 2001.
Correction
In the article "Lower cost copper solutions may drive 10-Gigabit Ethernet" in our August issue (pages 24-28), we left you hanging at the very end by failing to print the last few lines of the article. The concluding sentences in that article should have read:
"If 10GBase-T is to progress as a standard, it must be proven to support a large percentage of the Category 5e and Category 6 installed cable plant. In addition, new cabling specifications will certainly evolve to support 100% coverage for the 10GBase-T application."—Ed.