In 1Q17 the total wireless packet core market, consisting of the combined mobile and evolved packet core (EPC) segments, grew 3% Q/Q to $0.8 B. The market was down 11% compared to 1Q16 as a slight increase in EPC revenues was more than offset by a large decline in mobile packet core revenue. After market growth of 7% in 2016, we forecast that market growth will slow to 4% in 2017 as EPC sales surge 16%, more than mitigating a 23% decline in the legacy mobile packet core market.

The EPC market continues to be driven by the following (non-mutually exclusive) factors:

• Growth in mobile data traffic (bandwidth)
• Growth in mobile data sessions
• Transition from 2G/3G to LTE-based network traffic
• New services that employ the LTE or associated IMS network, like VoLTE, video-over-LTE (ViLTE), and VoWiFi.