Telecommunications equipment (also telecoms equipment or communications equipment) are hardware which are used for the purposes of telecommunications. Since the 1990s the boundary between telecoms equipment and IT hardware has become blurred as a result of the growth of the internet and its increasing role in the transfer of telecoms data.
Types
Telecommunications equipment can be broadly broken down into the following categories:
Public switching equipment
Analogue switches
Digital switches
Voice over IP switches
Virtual reality (VR) Transmission equipment Transmission lines Optical fiber Local loops Base transceiver stations Free-space optical communication Laser communication in space Multiplexers Communications satellites Customer premises equipment (CPE) Customer office terminal Private switches Local area networks (LANs) Modems Mobile phones Landline telephones Answering machines Teleprinters Fax machines Pagers Routers Wireless devices
Semiconductors
Most of the essential elements of modern telecommunication are built from MOSFETs (metal–oxide–semiconductor field-effect transistors), including mobile devices, transceivers, base station modules, routers, RF power amplifiers, microprocessors, memory chips, and telecommunication circuits. As of 2005, telecommunications equipment account for 16.5% of the annual microprocessor market.
Vendors
The world's largest telecommunications equipment vendors by revenues in 2017 are: