Webスケールネットワークオペレーターの世界市場の分析 (2023年第4四半期)：総設備投資が減少しても、2023年のネットワーク/IT設備投資は4%増加、2024～25年は生成AIの発展により良好な見通し、レイオフの中でも業界の収益性は大幅に上昇

当レポートでは、世界のWebスケールネットワークオペレーター (WNO) 市場における2011年以降の成長実績と発展動向について分析します。 直近12ヵ月間 (2023年第1四半期～2023年第4四半期) のWebスケール事業者の収益は2兆3,700億米ドル (前年同期比6.2%増)、研究開発費は2,930億米ドル (同9.4%増)、設備投資額は1,920億米ドル (同5.1%減) となりました。 2023年12月時点の現金・短期投資残高は6,790億米ドル (前年比9.8%増)、負債総額は5,620億米ドル (同1.9%増) です。 Webスケーラーの2023年末時点の従業員数は約409万3,000人で、2022年末時点の419万4,000人から減少しました。

ビジュアル

Webスケールの収益：2023年の対前年成長率 (YoY) はどの時期も加速傾向

Webスケール部門の売上は2022年には低迷しましたが、2023年にはその逆となりました。2023年には、世界経済の成長が改善し、デジタル広告市場が回復し、TikTokが反動に直面し始め、クラウドサービスの普及が進み、Huaweiのデバイス事業が低迷を続けた。すべての要因が、Webスケール・トラッカーで測定された収益の伸びを押し上げる傾向を示しました。

2023年の各四半期の対前年成長率 (YoY) は上昇し、その結果、2023年の年間売上高は2022年より6.2%増の2兆2,370億米ドルとなりました。

Webスケール部門の従業員1人当たりの売上高は、2022年の53万9,000米ドルから2023年には58万4,000米ドルとなり、従業員1人当たりのフリーキャッシュフローは2022年の7万3,000米ドルから2023年には10万9,000米ドルと、さらに顕著に急増しました。従業員一人当たりのフリーキャッシュフローは、2022年の7万3,000米ドルから2023年には10万9,000米ドルへとさらに顕著に急増しました。これらの変動は、売上高が増加し、利益がさらに急速に増加したことと、この2年間で従業員数の増加が一服したことの両方によるものです。Webスケールの2023年末の従業員数は409万3,000人で、2021年末の数字からは若干増加しましたが、2022年の合計419万4,000人からは大幅に減少しました。大手Webスケーラーが人件費削減を求めて自社の業務に生成AIを導入しようとしているため、この業界全体でさらなるレイオフが発生する可能性は十分にあります。同じことがすでに通信企業でも起こっています。

技術開発費：2023年の設備投資総額は減少したが、技術開発費は4%増加。

2023年の設備投資総額は少し減少し、5.1%減の1,920億米ドルとなりました。これは、市場のセンチメントが消極的であることを意味しません。四半期ごとの設備投資額は、サプライチェーンやその他の問題によって大きく変動する可能性があり、Webスケール市場は、少数の大手企業によって牽引されているため、特に不安定です。さらに、2023年の設備投資額のうちハイテク部門は前年比4%増と、実際に伸びています。

Webスケールの研究開発費は、2023年には売上高の12.3%に達し、2022年の12.0%を上回っています。これは、ロボット工学や医療、金融サービスなどの新市場に参入するために各社が多額の研究開発費を投じているためです。この研究開発費の大部分は、データセンター運営の基盤となる物理的インフラ、つまり、よりスマートなソフトウェアだけでなく、新しいチップやその他のハードウェアの独自技術開発にも向けられています。

米国がWebスケール設備投資の50%以上を占める

米国は過去10年間、世界のWebスケール設備投資の50～60%を占めてきました。この割合は過去2年間で増加し、2023年には60%強に達します。米国は、当面の間、単一の国市場としては圧倒的に大きな存在であり続ける見通しです。主要な生成AIイノベーターのほとんどが米国に拠点を置き、米国のインターネットインフラに大きく依存しているため、データセンターの設備投資もこのパターンに従うと考えられています。しかし、Webスケーラーが他地域に拠点を拡大するにつれ、米国比率は数年以内に50%以下に戻る可能性があります。中国を拠点とするクラウド・プロバイダーによる支出の増加は、この減速の原動力のひとつとなるでしょう。

Webスケール市場と通信事業者の比較

10年前、Webスケール分野は存在しませんでした。大手ハイテク企業は、コスト構造、運用効率、市場投入までの時間を最適化するため、独自のデータセンターを構築し始めたばかりでした。しかし、Webスケールの設備投資は、ネットワーク・インフラ市場全体から見れば微々たるものでした。しかし、今はそうではありません。Webスケールの設備投資額は、2022年に初めて2,000億米ドルを突破しました。その後、Webスケールの設備投資額は年換算で2,000億米ドルを下回りましたたが、これは短期的なものです。

支出見通し

2023年の設備投資額はやや落ち込んだもの、主要企業は市場が十分に発展・定義される前からGenAIの機会を追求しているため、見通しは堅調です。

予測の更新

2023年12月の予測では、2023年のWebスケールの設備投資額を2,020億米ドルと予想していましたが、これは実態より少し高すぎました。2024年と2025年の公式目標は、それぞれ2,030億米ドルと2,180億米ドルです。

調査範囲

WNO (Webスケールネットワークオペレーター) 上位8社

その他のWNO

目次

• 1. 概要
• 2. 分析
• 3. WNO市場：主要統計
• 4. 企業の詳細
• 5. WNO 上位8社
• 6. 企業のベンチマーク
• 7. 地域別の内訳
• 8. 原データ
• 9. 為替レート
• 10. MTN Consultingについて

This report reviews the growth and development of the webscale network operator (WNO) market since 2011. In the most recent 12 months (1Q23-4Q23), webscalers represented $2.37 trillion (T) in revenues (+6.2% YoY), $293 billion (B) in R&D spending (+9.4% YoY), and $192B in capex (-5.1% YoY). They had $679B of cash and short-term investments (+9.8% YoY) on the books as of December 2023, and $562B in total debt (+1.9% YoY). Webscalers employed approximately 4.093 million (M) people at the end of 2023, down from the YE2022 total of 4.194M.

VISUALS

bscale revenues accelerate YoY growth rate each quarter of 2023

Revenues for the webscale sector floundered in 2022, but the opposite happened in 2023. In 2023, global economic growth improved, the digital ad market recovered, TikTok began to face some backlash, cloud services penetration marched on, and Huawei's device business remained in the doldrums. All factors tended to benefit the revenue growth measured by our webscale tracker.

Each quarter of 2023 saw an increase in the YoY growth rate, resulting in annual 2023 revenues of $2.237 trillion, up 6.2% from 2022. Improvements were widespread. China's leading cloud services providers (Alibaba, Baidu and Tencent) all went from revenue declines in 2022 to increases in 2023; Amazon's revenues grew 11.8% in CY23 increase (2022: 9.8%) and Microsoft's rose 11.5% (2022: 10.4%). Most significant, perhaps, was Meta's big jump, growing revenues by just under 16% in 2023 after 2022, when revenues fell for the first time in history. Alphabet remained stable with revenue growth again in the 8-10% YoY range. Apple disappointed with a -0.5% YoY change as it still struggles to find growth now that 5G networks are widely deployed. Oracle performed very well for its size, growing 12.1% due to a mix of acquisition activity and success with its Oracle cloud infrastructure platform.

Revenues per employee in the webscale sector ended 2023 at $584K, from $539K in 2022; free cash flow per employee jumped even more noticeably, from $73K in 2022 to $109K in 2023. These swings are due both to rising revenues and even more quickly rising profits, and the sector's headcount growth taking a pause in the last two years. Webscale headcount ended 2023 at 4.093M, slightly up from the YE2021 figure but handily down from the 2022 total of 4.194M. Meta saw by far the biggest dip in its workforce, down 22% in 2023 to 67,300. This recent wave of layoffs was due in part to overhiring during COVID. There is a good chance that we will see additional layoffs across the sector though as big webscalers attempt to impement Generative AI in their own operations in search of labor cost savings. The same thing is already happening in the telco sector.

Tech spending: total capex dipped in 2023 but the tech portion rose 4%; R&D spend remains elevated

The main reason we cover webscalers is because we care about their technology spend. Webscalers spend heavily on data centers and related cloud infrastructure in support of both their services and operations. So, while it's important to know about revenue & profitability trends in webscale, the vendors selling into the market (our main clients) care about technology spend. That means capex and R&D. And not just capex in general, but more specifically the technology component of capex, i.e. "Network/IT/software" broadly defined.

Total capex did fall a bit in 2023, down 5.1% to $192B. This doesn't imply a negative market sentiment. Capex spend by quarter can vary significantly due to supply chain and other issues, and the webscale market is especially volatile since it's driven by just a few big players; the top 4 capture 77% of global capex, after all. Moreover, the tech portion of capex actually grew in 2023, up 4% YoY. The disparity is due to an easing of spend on transportation, logistics, fulfillment and non-tech infra categories at Amazon, Alphabet, Alibaba and others.

R&D spend within webscale amounted to 12.3% of revenues in 2023, even higher than the 12.0% recorded in 2022. The R&D intensity ratio has been creeping up in webscale for some time, as companies spend heavily to enter into new markets such as robotics, healthcare, financial services, and more. A good chunk of this R&D cash also targets the development of proprietary tech for the physical infrastructure of data centers underlying their operations: new chips and other hardware, not just smarter software.

Looking beyond the 2023 numbers, what is most important is that last year the webscale market found a new lifeforce, a new reason for being.

For the prior several years, adoption of cloud services was a primary motivator for incremental investments; they drove data center spread and design evolution at Alphabet, Amazon, Microsoft and Oracle. Short-form video content and gaming were also important drivers. This could be seen in the big related investments made by Alphabet and Meta, and Microsoft's biggest acquisition ever (of Activision, for $69B). Then in early 2023 - alongside these other trends - GenerativeAI's potential suddenly reached mass market awareness. In reality, GenAI was cooking for many years prior to this, but January 2023 was a turning point with the release of ChatGPT: it reached 100 million users by the end of the month. Other platforms were rushed to market, and any big tech company (webscaler or not) without investments in GenAI quickly scurried around to cobble something together, or invest in a third party. Amazon, for instance, invested heavily in Anthropic, as did Alphabet. Chinese webscalers each launched their own native offerings.

There is surely some unrealistic hype being floated about the potential of GenAI to solve all the world's problems - cure diseases, find solutions to global conflict, invent new forms of transportation, etc. This happens every time markets get excited about a new technology. There is always a 'tech leader' willing to make obnoxiously grandiose statements, and always a receptive audience to echo some of the nonsense. That said, GenAI has real potential to develop new markets over the next few years, and it is a legitimate reason to accelerate data center investments. The exact shape and size and location of such investments are not yet clear, and that uncertainty can slow down investment. But GenAI is not going away. We suspect the quest to monetize GenAI will drive a land grab for more capable data centers and supporting supercomputer clusters for several years to come.

US accounts for over 50% of webscale capex

This report series traditionally breaks out revenues by region for each webscaler. Towards the end of 2023, we added our first regional breakout of capex, focused on the US. Our analysis finds that the US has amounted to between 50-60% of global webscale capex for most of the last decade. This percentage increased in the last two years, ending 2023 at just over 60%. The US will continue to be the largest single country market, by far, for the foreseeable future. Most of the key GenAI innovators are based in the US and rely heavily on US Internet infrastructure, and data center capex will follow this pattern. However, the US ratio may return below 50% within a couple of years as webscalers expand their footprints in other regions. Spending pickups by China-based cloud providers will be one driver of this moderation.

Webscale market compared to telecom

A decade ago, the webscale sector did not exist. Big tech companies were just beginning to build their own data centers to optimize their cost structure, operational efficiency, and time to market. But webscale capex was a rounding error in the overall market for network infrastructure. That's not the case anymore. Webscale capex surpassed $200B for the first time in 2022. Annualized webscale capex has since fallen below $200B, but that is a short-term blip.

Telco capex is still higher, and will remain so for the next few years. But, webscale capex is far more concentrated, as it is dominated by a few big spenders, and it is focused on a smaller range of product types and vendors. Some aspects of webscale capex are more leading edge; innovations in the data center often impact other types of networks (e.g. high-speed optics for telco backbone networks). As such, the market will continue to be important for lots of vendors - and not just chip suppliers like NVIDIA, Intel and AMD.

Spending outlook

While capex dipped a bit in 2023, the outlook is strong as key players pursue GenAI opportunities even before that market is well developed or defined. Here is a summary of the spending outlook for key webscalers:

• Amazon (27.4% of global webscale capex): CY23 capex of $48.4B was down $10.2B YoY, mainly due to lower fulfillment and transport spend. In 2024, company expects capex to increase YoY due mainly to infra spend at AWS, due partly to adding capacity in AWS for regional expansions, and "additional investments in generative AI and large language models"
• Microsoft (18.3%): 4Q23 capex was lower than expected due to a third party capacity issue, but capex will "increase materially" on a sequential basis in 1Q24, driven by cloud and AI infrastructure. Company notes, "You started to see the acceleration in our capital expense starting almost a year ago...looking forward, you'll tend to see ... accelerating capital expense to continue to be able to add capacity in the coming quarters, given what we see in terms of pipeline." Also, is considering a $100B supercomputer data center campus needing up to 5GW of power, in concert with OpenAI, to develop AI models. Could open in 2028, coined "Stargate".
• Alphabet (16.8%): reported capex in 4Q23 was $11B, driven by servers and then data centers. The 4Q stepup in reflects company's outlook "for the extraordinary applications of AI to deliver for users, advertisers, developers, cloud enterprise customers and governments globally and the long-term growth opportunities that offers. In 2024, we expect investment in CapEx will be notably larger than in 2023." Drivers include "the extraordinary applications of AI within Google DeepMind, Google Services, Google Cloud, it's across the board for users, for advertisers, developers, cloud enterprise customers, governments. And it's really the long-term opportunity that offers."
• Meta (FB) (14.2%): expects CY24 capex of $30 to $37 billion, a $2B increase above prior range. Notes that it underbuilt the infra needed to support the growth of Reels in 2023 - is building to support both Reels and another similar sized service "so we wouldn't be in that situation again." Capex growth to be "driven by investments in servers, including both AI and non-AI hardware, and data centers as we ramp up construction on sites with our previously announced new data center architecture." Not providing guidance for 2025 and beyond but says it expects that its "ambitious long-term AI research and product development efforts will require growing infrastructure investments beyond this year."
• Apple (5.0%): as usual does not provide capex guidance, just says it will "never underinvest in the business..."
• Oracle (3.6%): 4Q23 capex was $1.1B. Expected capex for 12 months ended May 2024 is $8B, meaning "second half CapEx will be considerably higher as we bring online more capacity..."
• Chinese cloud providers: no concrete guidance but early signs in 2024 point to increased spend as all key players are investing in GenAI platforms and attempting to accelerate cloud revenue growth, including overseas. Alibaba, for one, appears to be pushing a price war. Domestically, the telcos are strong in cloud services in China, and also provide carrier-neutral site services, as do GDS/ChinData/Vianet etc. Huawei is also a strong cloud player in China. So, the mainstream webscalers face more competition but also more options for building out their footprint.

Forecast update

Our Dec 2023 forecast called for $202B in 2023 webscale capex; that proved a bit too high. The official targets for 2024 and 2025 are $203B and $218B, respectively. We see no reason to modify these targets, but note that there is now significant uncertainty. They could be too low, but, some of the optimistic projections issued by webscalers will change as they face resource constraints or pursue more asset light strategies, or be crowded out by companies not currently classed as webscalers e.g. OpenAI. One certainty is that this is an exciting time to be selling into data center infra markets.

COVERAGE

Top 8 WNOs

Other WNOs

Table of Contents

• 1. Abstract
• 2. Analysis
• 3. WNO Market: Key Stats
• 4. Company Drilldown
• 5. Top 8 WNOs
• 6. Company Benchmarking
• 7. Regional Breakouts
• 8. Raw Data
• 9. Exchange Rates
• 10. About

FIGURES & CHARTS

• 1. Key Metrics: Growth rates, Annualized 4Q23/4Q22 vs. 2019-23
• 2. WNO Revenues: Single-quarter & annualized (US$M)
• 3. Top 8 WNOs: YoY revenue growth in 4Q23
• 4. Annualized profitability: WNOs
• 5. Free cash flow per employee, 4Q23 annualized (US$)
• 6. FCF Margins vs. Net Margins, 4Q23 annualized
• 7. Advertising revenues as % total (FY2023)
• 8. Annualized capex and R&D spending: WNOs (% revenues)
• 9. WNO capex by type, Annualized: 4Q15-4Q23 (US$M)
• 10. Network & IT capex as share of revenues, 4Q23 annualized
• 11. R&D expenses as % revenues, Top 8 WNOs (4Q23 annualized)
• 12. Acquisition spending vs. capex spending, annualized (US$M)
• 13. Net PP&E per employee (US$' 000) - 4Q23
• 14. Ranking the Webscale Network Operators: Revenues; R&D; Capex; Network & IT capex - 2023 & 4Q23 (US$B)
• 15. Annualized spending share for key webscalers since 2011 Capex: Network, IT and software
• 16. Share of webscale spending by company, 4Q23 and 4Q22 annualized (Capex: Network, IT and software)
• 17. Energy consumption vs. Net PP&E for key webscalers in 2022
• 18. USA: Webscale capex total ($M) and % of global market, 2011-23
• 19. Webscale vs. Telco Market: Annualized Capex (US$B)
• 20. Webscale vs. Telco Market: Annualized capital intensity
• 21. Revenues: annual, single-quarter, and annualized (US$M)
• 22. Profitability (Net Profit; Cash from operations; Free cash flow): annual, single-quarter, and annualized (US$M)
• 23. Spending (R&D; M&A; Capex; Network & IT capex; Lease): annual, single-quarter, and annualized (US$M)
• 24. Cash & Short-term Investments: annual and single-quarter (US$M)
• 25. Debt (Total debt; Net debt): annual and single-quarter (US$M)
• 26. Property, Plant & Equipment: annual and single-quarter (US$M)
• 27. Key Ratios: Net margin; R&D/revenues; Capex/revenues; Network & IT capex/revenues; Free cash flow/revenues; Lease costs/revenues - annual and annualized (%)
• 28. Total employees
• 29. Revenue per employee, annualized (US$K)
• 30. FCF per employee, annualized (US$K)
• 31. Net PP&E per employee, annualized (US$K)
• 32. Revenues & Spending (US$M)
• 33. Webscale Business Mix by Revenues (FY2023) - MTN Consulting estimates
• 34. Top 10 recent acquisitions & investments
• 35. Data center footprint
• 36. Revenues (US$M) & YoY revenue growth (%), single-quarter: by company
• 37. Revenues, annualized (US$M): by company
• 38. Annualized profitability margins: by company
• 39. Annualized capex and capital intensity: by company
• 40. Annualized capex and R&D spending as % of revenues: by company
• 41. Share of WNO network & IT capex, Annualized: by company
• 42. Total employees: by company
• 43. Annualized per-employee metrics (US$000s): by company
• 44. Net debt (debt minus cash & stock) (US$M): by company
• 45. 2011 vs. 2023: company benchmark by KPI (Revenues, R&D, Net profit, Cash from operations, Capex, Free cash flow, Cash & short-term investments, Net PP&E, Total debt)
• 46. 2011 vs. 2022: company benchmark by key ratio (Capex/revenues; R&D/revenues; Net margin; FCF margin)
• 47. Top 8 WNO's share vs. Rest of the market: by KPI (Revenues, R&D, Net profit, Cash from operations, Capex, Free cash flow, Cash & short-term investments, Net PP&E, Total debt)
• 48. Top 8 WNOs benchmarking by Key ratio: Capex/revenues; R&D/revenues; Net margin; FCF margin)
• 49. Total WNO Market Revenues, by region: Latest CY; Latest Quarter; Annual trend (2011-23); Single quarter (4Q15-4Q23 )
• 50. WNO Market: Revenues, single-quarter (YoY % change)
• 51. Regional revenues by operator: Latest CY; Latest Quarter; Annual trend (2011-22); Single quarter (4Q15-4Q23)
• 52. Top 10 operators by region: Latest CY; Latest Quarter