Limelight Networks Releases 2020 CDN Market Outlook
Expanding CDN offerings from custom services and cloud providers

In 2020, the CDN market is expected to continue its strong growth driven by increasing global OTT demand. Furthermore, revenue models utilizing cutting-edge technologies are expected to be developed, providing customized services.

Reflecting the high growth of the CDN market, specialized CDN companies are expected to develop additional services as cloud service providers provide CDN services.

According to the '2020 CDN (Contents Delivery Network) Market Outlook' released by Limelight Networks on January 17, as more people access the Internet and network bandwidth availability increases, web-based services will become more diverse and the demand for specialized CDN services will continue to increase.

The CDN market continues to show high growth.
With the explosive growth of demand for OTT (Over The Top), the biggest growth driver in the CDN market, live video streaming and other services can now provide the same level of audio and quality as traditional broadcasting.

Driven by the growth of the OTT business and the commercialization of 5G, clients distributing various media content such as broadcasting programs, movies, and education are demanding ultra-high definition, The demand for high-capacity, ultra-low-latency data processing is also increasing significantly.

The CDN market is expected to continue to show high growth rates, and as a result, the production and distribution of high-quality live content, which has traditionally been the domain of broadcasters, is expected to shift to live streaming.

According to network provider Sandvine, OTT streaming video accounts for over 60% of global internet bandwidth. As user demand for OTT services grows, the CDN market is expected to continue its strong growth.

Global consulting firm Deloitte forecasts the global CDN market size to reach $14 billion in 2020, a 25% increase from approximately $11 billion in 2019.

The CDN market is expected to grow at an annual rate of over 16% and reach $30 billion by 2025, more than doubling from 2020. CDNs are expected to account for 72% of all Internet traffic by 2022, up from 56% in 2017.

Providing customized and segmented customer services
CDN providers are currently evolving their service offerings and formats to meet customer needs.

Previously, the focus was solely on content distribution and delivery, concentrating on the efficiency of data processing and transmission. However, recently, the scope of services has expanded to include computing areas such as encoding, transcoding, mid-roll advertising, and data analysis.

Additionally, as CDN revenue models diversify into applications, security, IoT, and blockchain, demand for customized CDN service consulting and architecture is rapidly increasing.


Increased development of CDN services and value-added services
As media, telecommunications, and cloud service providers recognize the importance of CDNs, they are jumping into the development and market of cloud-based CDN services. It competed with existing CDN operators by offering relatively low prices.

Instead of lowering prices, professional CDN providers have developed various additional services to improve service quality and meet customer needs, leveraging the experience and know-how they have accumulated over many years in the CDN industry.

Here, we strive to provide customized products by combining only the services that our clients truly need through one-on-one personalized consulting.

While increased competition among service providers may lead to lower profitability, the integration of more cloud services and edge computing is expected to improve end-user satisfaction with CDN services.
“As more people access the Internet and the availability of network bandwidth increases, web-based services will become more diverse and perform better,” said Lee Hyung-geun, CEO of Lime Networks Korea. “This has evolved to support rapid software downloads, mobile content, and real-time delivery of rich media such as video.”