en.Wedoany.com Reported - A new report from Dell'Oro Group shows that in the first quarter of 2026, sales of Ethernet switches for AI backend networks more than doubled.
The analysis firm's "AI Backend Network Quarterly Report" indicates that Ethernet switches account for approximately two-thirds of data center switch sales dominated by AI clusters, further expanding their advantage as the leading network protocol. Although InfiniBand held 80% of the AI backend market share in 2023, Ethernet's rise is attributed to engineers' familiarity with the protocol and the integration of lossless technology, which was previously InfiniBand's strength. Dell'Oro Group had previously predicted that Ethernet would dominate data center-level networks, potentially driving approximately $80 billion in switch sales over the next five years.
The latest report shows that the deployment of AI clusters continues to drive strong demand for high-performance switches. However, while Ethernet dominates, demand for InfiniBand is also rebounding. The analysis firm stated that due to increased shipments of switches integrated with Nvidia's Blackwell Ultra platform, InfiniBand-related switch sales more than tripled this quarter. Earlier this week, the industry saw the first demonstration of a co-packaged optics network switch centered on InfiniBand—the Quantum-X Q3450-LD.
Sameh Boujelbene, Vice President at Dell'Oro Group, said: "While new deployments may have driven some growth, we believe a significant portion of this demand is related to upgrades of existing infrastructure (i.e., brownfield deployments), rather than new expansions." The report shows that despite InfiniBand's recovery, Ethernet still accounted for the vast majority of 800 Gigabit per second (Gb/s) switches sold this quarter, as operators continue to upgrade existing 400G stacks.
Samples of 1.6 Terabit per second (Tb/s) switches have also begun shipping, with acceleration expected in the second half of 2026. Early examples include Broadcom's Tomahawk Ultra, Edgecore's AIS1600-64Os, and Aria Networks' switch product line based on Broadcom's Tomahawk 6.
Beyond shipment details, the vendor landscape continues to diverge. Dell'Oro Group stated that this quarter, Celestica regained its leading position, followed closely by Nvidia, with networking becoming a core component of its infrastructure products beyond GPUs. Arista ranked third, though the analysis firm noted that a significant portion of its AI-related product revenue was deferred. Boujelbene said: "If Arista's deferred revenue for this quarter is included, its AI backend network sales would be very close to those of Celestica and Nvidia. Cisco saw the largest market share increase this quarter, ranking fourth. We expect that continued customer diversification, vendor competition, and the transition to higher speeds will continue to drive market share changes in this segment."
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