Retail Co-location a Bigger Opportunity for Mobile Operators Than Wholesale?

With the caveat that cloud computing and edge computing are different segments of the computing market, retail co-location might be a bigger opportunity than wholesale co-location. Retail co-location, where a tenant leases rack space or a cage, might seem the obvious value connectivity providers can offer in the edge computing space.

source: Synergy Research Group

It seems relatively unlikely that wholesale co-location, where a third party leases the entire facility, is the most-logical opportunity for connectivity providers. 

Still, hyperscale computing firms are the fastest growing customer category for co-location providers, Synergy Research Group says. For both wholesale and retail co-location, first quarter 2020 revenue from hyperscale customers grew more rapidly than revenues from other service provider customers or enterprises. 

While the overall co-location market grew by seven percent, compared with 2019, revenues from hyperscale operators grew by 22 percent in the wholesale segment of the market and by nine percent in the retail segment. 

While a wholesale approach might be part of the mobile operator edge computing opportunity, retail seems likely the more prevalent use case.