Telecom Lead Asia: Ruckus Wireless CEO Selina Lo says Indian mobile operators are gearing up to invest in Wi-Fi offload solutions to enhance 3G and 4G performance.
At present, 3G and 4G operators are in the process of expanding their services across the country. In order to improve customer experience, investing in Wi-Fi solutions will become important for telecom operators.
With 2011 revenues of $120 million, the company offers a range of indoor and outdoor Smart Wi-Fi products to mobile carriers, broadband service providers, and corporate enterprises, and has more than 18,000 customers worldwide.
Ruckus technology addresses Wi-Fi capacity and coverage challenges caused by the ever-increasing amount of traffic on wireless networks due to accelerated adoption of mobile devices such as smartphones and tablets.
Ruckus Wireless CEO Selina Lo
Besides Indian telecom operators, Ruckus Wireless works with several enterprise customers to offer wireless systems for the rapidly expanding mobile Internet infrastructure market. “India is a big market for us. We are in the process of expanding resources in both sales and R&D,” Lo told TelecomLead.com during her recent visit to Bangalore, India.
“We will also be introducing India focused products in coming months. Our focus is on increasing the number of trained partners in the country,” Lo added.
Recently, Ruckus Wireless said it plans to grow its headcount by 50 percent in India.
ABI Research, in a recently published report, said the top scoring Wi-Fi vendors for implementation include Cisco, Ruckus Wireless and Alcatel-Lucent.
The research agency noted that competitive dynamics are heating up in this segment with companies like Cisco and Ruckus Wireless moving into areas traditionally held by mobile infrastructure vendors and the mobile infrastructure vendors like Ericsson, Alcatel-Lucent, and Nokia Siemens Networks moving into the Wi-Fi segment.
“Although not our top ranked company today, we believe Ruckus Wireless could prove to be among the winners in this segment in the future,” said ABI Research principal analyst Nick Marshall.
Setting up Wi-Fi zones for enterprises is also adding revenue streams for Ruckus in India.
American hotel chains like Kimpton, Peninsula and Fairmont are aiming to increase revenues per available room and maximize profitability using Ruckus Smart Wi-Fi ZoneFlex access points for stronger Wi-Fi signals, ubiquitous coverage, more stable connections and consistent performance.
According to Hotel Internet Services (HIS), a provider of secure wired and wireless Internet services, Ruckus ZoneFlex Smart Wi-Fi has contributed to significant reductions in guest complaints for its customers across the United States.
Ruckus Wireless recorded a net profit of $6.1 million, on revenue of $94 million for the six months ended June 30, 2012.
