|
|
|
02 Jun 2008
Comments:1
Rumours of an impending deal worth about $120-130m (£60-65m) have circulated recently, but Trapeze’s worldwide business development director Alistair Mutch played down the hearsay.
“There have been stories for the last year and a half,” he said. “I can confirm that we have not been bought by Belden.”
Belden specialises in high speed electronic cables, but has recently dipped its toe into wireless waters with the addition of WLAN switches to its product range. Its first foray into the market was in 2006, when it established a technology partnership with vendor Extricom.
Further reading
One industry source claimed that, if a deal with Trapeze went ahead, it could be good news for the vendor’s rivals. “There would be a conflict in culture as Belden is a long-in-the-tooth company. $120m is also a tiny amount,” the source said.
“The market would be shrunk down to Cisco and Aruba and I think it could also benefit niche players.”
The source also indicated he felt Trapeze had been hamstrung in recent years by its OEM agreements with companies including Nortel and 3Com. “By doing OEM agreements you are selling your soul. It gets product out there but you cannot make any money.”
Rob Bamforth, principal analyst for Quocirca, told CRN: “I think we are likely to see more consolidation in the WLAN space, especially as you get towards real 802.11N technology, as opposed to draft N.”
Related articles
In this video find out about the fast-growing Chinese vendor's plans for market domination and how the channel is its route of choice
Find out what gifts Acer has in store for partners for 2012 in this exclusive roundup of its recent conference
CRN's premier networking event is back on 17 May at the Ricoh Arena
Date: Thu 17 May 2012
Channel fighters preparing to square up once more on 24 May
Date: Thu 24 May 2012
The proliferation of endpoint devices within the enterprise has highlighted the shortcomings of one of the traditional approaches to data security
This Forrester report compares the costs and benefits of legacy email and productivity software with Google Apps
Dave discovers that rozzers are seemingly living in the technology dark ages
Mark Needham, founder of distributor Widget, argues that John Browett leaves for Apple with Dixons in better shape than when he arrived
|
|
|
Do you agree?
This would NOT be a good thing for the other WLAN players....
..... except for Cisco and Aruba. Trapeze, which is the No. 4 player in terms of revenue in this space, selling for low $100M is a bad thing for No. 5 Meru, who either needs to get bought or raise more $$. If Aruba valuation is under $500M, and Trapeze at $100M, that's an ugly picture in this climate for either a sale or raising another round.
Trapeze going at $100M or so accelerates a firesale and/or demise of startups in this space.
Posted by John | 03 Jun 2008
Have your say