The campus Network as a Service (NaaS) market is set for significant growth in the coming years, with startups leading the charge. According to a recent report from Dell’Oro Group, startups offering LAN-as-a-Utility solutions are expected to outpace other types of campus NaaS providers and capture a third of all campus NaaS revenues by 2028. Nile, Meter, Join Digital, and Ramen Networks are among the notable startups in this space.
They are ramping up their deployment capabilities and expanding their portfolios with complementary products like 5G solutions. These companies are also forging strategic partnerships to scale their businesses. Siân Morgan, research director at Dell’Oro Group, stated, “The LAN-as-a-Utility offers are designed to take share from incumbent equipment vendors.
With their innovative technology and business models, they are also creating new use-cases that will expand the overall IT market.”
The startups are optimistic about their growth prospects. Partho Mishra, CEO of Ramen Networks, said, “We are building a NaaS solution for the uncarpeted enterprise. We continued to see rapid growth in customer deployments.”
Rishit Lakhani, solutions engineering leader at Nile, highlighted the importance of security in driving interest in campus NaaS.
Campus NaaS startups lead market surge
“We already deliver significantly improved zero-trust capabilities through the segmentation of users and devices, as well as the elimination of VLANs,” Lakhani said. Meter is experiencing rapid growth with a diverse customer base, ranging from startups to large enterprises.
Sean Rose, who leads product at Meter, noted innovations such as Command, a generative UI for IT teams to manage networks, and Cellular, a cell service deployed as easily as Wi-Fi. The Dell’Oro Group report also found that HPE maintains the largest breadth of offers in the campus NaaS Enabler category. Additionally, the annual recurring revenue of major LAN vendors, especially those with high adoption of public cloud-managed LAN solutions, has accelerated.
This trend suggests a potential reversal of the subscription license price erosion seen in recent years. The public cloud-managed LAN market is expected to exceed $12 billion by 2028. Despite a slow start for campus NaaS deployments, annual revenues are predicted to surpass $940 million in the same timeframe.
As the campus NaaS market continues to evolve, startups are well-positioned to drive innovation and capture a larger share of the pie. Their focus on LAN-as-a-Utility solutions, partnerships, and complementary offerings will likely fuel their growth in the coming years.
