Proxim's equipment is designed to provide WISPs with a complete, centrally managed solution. The company incorporates brands from Western Digital, YDI, Agere, and Terabeam, as well as several others.

by Jeff Goldman [June 25, 2008]

Proxim Wireless was founded back in 1984. According to company director of product and channel marketing Milind Bhise, what makes Proxim's offering stand out is the fact that it's an end-to-end solution. "If you look at a typical broadband wireless network, you have the access piece, which is predominantly Wi-Fi; you have the distribution or aggregation piece, which is some type of point-to-multipoint technology, whether it's WiMax or WiMax-like; and then you have point-to-point high-bandwidth fat pipes for core networks… and we have offerings that span across all of those segments," he says.

Proxim is able offer a complete portfolio thanks to its acquisitions. "The different technologies work differently—if you take WLAN and WiMax, one came and evolved entirely from the IP side of the world, and the other evolved from the RF side of the world… we've been lucky enough that we also went through some M&A transactions in the past, so we have the skill set in place," he says.

Proxim Wireless 2115 O'Nel Drive San Jose, CA 95131 Toll free: (800) 229-1630 Fax: (408) 720-9385 Voice: (408) 731-2700

History
Proxim Wireless' corporate history gets a little complicated, but follow along if you can… YDI Wireless was created in April of 2003 as a result of the merger of the millimeter-wave wireless company Telaxis Communications and the microwave wireless company Young Design, Inc. In May of 2004, the new company acquired the wireless software provider KarlNet, Inc., and in June of the same year, YDI acquired the broadband wireless company Terabeam Corporation—after which YDI adopted the name Terabeam Wireless.

And the acquisitions continued.

In June of 2004, the company purchased the struggling WISP Ricochet Networks, and in July of 2005, it acquired the operations of the bankrupt wireless equipment provider Proxim Corporation. Proxim, which was created back in 1984, had been a founding member of both the Wireless LAN Interoperability Forum and the HomeRF Working Group. The company had made its own series of acquisitions as well, including Western Multiplex in January of 2002 and Agere Systems' WLAN business in June of the same year.

More recently, in September of 2007, Terabeam changed its name to Proxim Wireless.

A complete offering
Today, Proxim's product portfolio covers three technology segments: WLAN (both indoor and outdoor), point-to-multipoint (primarily WiMax), and point-to-point. Company director of product and channel marketing Milind Bhise says the end-to-end nature of the offering is a key differentiator for the company. "If you look at a typical broadband wireless network, you have the access piece, which is predominantly Wi-Fi; you have the distribution or aggregation piece, which is some type of point-to-multipoint technology, whether it's WiMax or WiMax-like; and then you have point-to-point high-bandwidth fat pipes for core networks… and we have offerings that span across all of those segments," he says.

International demand
According to company CEO Pankaj Manglik, about half of Proxim's business today is in the U.S., and the other half is international. In emerging economies, Manglik says, providers turn to wireless for both backhaul (WiMax) and last mile (WLAN) connectivity, largely because thieves and/or competitors will often cut any wired connections—"It's a little bit of a Wild West situation," he says.

Wireless equipment can more easily be protected. "They basically lock the equipment up and they do these wireless shots, and then things work perfectly well," Manglik says.

In developed countries, Manglik says he's seeing particular growth in wireless deployments for security, video surveillance, and public safety. "It's fire trucks and ambulances, it's monitoring subways, it's monitoring bridges—the range of applications is huge," he says. That also includes everything from wireless cameras to monitor for drivers running through red lights, to wireless synchronization of traffic lights—and for those applications, Manglik says, WiMax and point-to-point technologies are key.

For all of those product segments, Manglik says, the company's ProximVision Network Management System gives any provider a single, centralized management platform for all equipment. "If they buy the wireless LAN piece from us and then they buy the WiMax from us, they don't want us to sell them two different management platforms… we have one management platform that manages our entire product line," he says. "When customers buy products across segments, they like to buy them from the same vendor, because it makes the management and maintenance and servicing of that network easier… and there are very few vendors in the world that have the entire product portfolio that Proxim does."

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