A recent report from research group IHS (News - Alert) shows that the demand for enterprise session border controllers (eSBC) has risen substantially over the past year and that the market is poised for growth through at least 2019. However, there is some concern that a drop in unit prices could keep that future growth modest.

Global revenue in the eSBC market, IHS noted, reached $65 million in the first quarter of 2015. That represents an increase of eight percent over the first quarter last year. This is strong showing, but it somewhat belies the fact that quarter-to-quarter numbers (Q4 2014 to Q1 2015) revealed a drop in the market of 11 percent—largely due to a decrease in prices for hardware units. Diane Myers, the research director for VoIP, UC, and IMS at IHS, spoke to this point in the research group's overview of its report.

“While the market grew year-over-year in 1Q15, it still came in lower than our original forecast due to a drop in average pricing as large deals garnered attractive pricing in the quarter,” Myers said.

That drop in growth from the previous quarter could ultimately be the predictor of a future downward trend in the market. Lower prices across the board could mean decreased revenue potential, yet there appears to be enough momentum with SBCs that will keep it going throughout the latter part of the decade. IHS predicts that SBCs will be the technology that will replace VoIP gateways and therefore will have enough demand to grab six percent compound annual growth rate from 2014 to 2019.

Who will be leading this charge? Businesses in North America are the primary drivers of change in the market. Notably, Cisco (News - Alert) held almost a quarter of market revenue in Q1 2015. Its counterparts AudioCodes, Oracle, and Avaya followed with notable market shares of their own.