Updated December 05, 2017 – As predicated below, cable box maker, ARRIS International completed its acquisition of Ruckus Wireless from Broadcom in December 2017. According to reports, “Ruckus Networks, an ARRIS company,” will operate as a dedicated business under the ARRIS Enterprise Networks business segment.
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Ruckus Wireless was founded in 2004 and supplied Wi-Fi services and equipment to enterprises and service providers. At its peak, it had annual revenues of almost $400 million and more than 1,000 employees. Ruckus was the first firm to roll out enterprise 802.11ac Wave 2 AP. The company’s products powered high-profile public Wi-Fi installations, such as New York City’s LinkNYC.
In April 2016, San Jose, CA-based Brocade purchased Ruckus Wireless in a deal worth about $1.5 billion. Brocade is most famous for data center SAN switches and a player on the NFV and SDN scene. Brocade planned to add Ruckus’s Wi-Fi products to its enterprise networking business.
At the time of the purchase, Brocade CEO Lloyd Carney said, “The acquisition will strengthen Brocade’s ability to pursue emerging market opportunities around 5G mobile services, Internet of Things (IoT), Smart Cities, OpenG technology for in-building wireless, and LTE/Wi-Fi convergence.”
Ruckus changed hands. Irvine, CA-based chipmaker Broadcom (AVGO), which supplies to phone vendors purchased Brocade for $5.9 billion. But the chipmaker said it plans to divest the Brocade IP networking business that consists of wireless networking, data center switching, and software networking offerings.
Brocade CEO Lloyd Carney wrote on the company’s website. “In terms of our IP Networking business, due to competitive overlap with some of Broadcom’s most important customers, Broadcom will seek a buyer for the business.” The Ruckus product line competes with industry titans like Cisco and Apple.
Broadcom
CEO Hock Tan said in a press release, “… we will find a great home for Brocade’s valuable IP networking business that will best position that business for its next phase of growth.” It seems Broadcom has found a firm willing to take Ruckus off their hands.
FierceCable is reporting that cable set-top box manufacturer Arris (ARRS) is in talks with Broadcom to pay around $1 billion for Brocade’s wireless network edge business – i.e Ruckus Wireless. The article says Arris CFO David Potts told investors that the vendor might transition into serving the wireless needs of its customers. Arris client, Comcast is developing a wireless service based on its MVNO relationship with Verizon.
Reports are that Arris does not want to buy other parts of the business being divested by Brocade. Brocade is reportedly looking for a buyer for the rest of its IP portfolio, which includes data centers, switching, and software.
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Ralph Bach has been in IT long enough to know better and has blogged from his Bach Seat about IT, careers, and anything else that catches his attention since 2005. You can follow him on LinkedIn, Facebook, and Twitter. Email the Bach Seat here.
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