Study: Demand for wired buildings to skyrocket

Communications equipment and services for office parks and other commercial multi-tenant unit buildings will reach a value of nearly $2 billion by 2004, according to a new study.

Industry research firm Cahners In-Stat Group today predicted the U.S. market will grow to $2 billion from the current value of $371 million.

Dozens of companies, including Allied Riser Communications, Urban Media, Broadband Office, Cypress Communications, Brix Communications and several others are signing deals with property management firms and landlords to wire their office buildings for high-speed Internet access and other communications services.

The competition for providing communications services to business customers so far has been fierce. By pre-wiring office buildings, the batch of so-called on-site service providers hope to lure medium and large-sized business customers into using their services.

Cahners believes many property owners will view pre-wired office buildings as a differentiating factor that could attract new tenants, making partnerships with the on-site service providers desirable.

The Cahners report suggests the multi-tenant unit (MTU) equipment market will represent "an increasing revenue opportunity" and that the pre-wired office buildings will lead to new services for business customers, such as virtual private networks (VPNs), video conferencing and network management services.