Looks similar to Arista’s switches, and I see SDN (software-defined networking) mentioned on this page, along with the Memphis Grizzlies arena in the background (I guess Pera is proud of his team ownership and glad to have that saga in the past).
Hi volfan84,
I would say not really. This page (http://ir.ubnt.com/) pretty clearly illuminates their focus as:
Ubiquiti Networks, Inc. currently focuses on 3 main technologies: high-capacity distributed Internet access, unified information technology, and next-gen consumer electronics for home and personal use.
And elsewhere on the IR site:
Ubiquiti Networks® develops high performance networking technology for service providers and enterprises. Our technology platforms focus on delivering highly-advanced and easily deployable solutions that appeal to a global customer base in underserved and underpenetrated markets. Our differentiated business model has enabled us to break down traditional barriers such as high product and network deployment costs and offer solutions with disruptive price-performance characteristics. This differentiated business model, combined with our innovative proprietary technologies, has resulted in an attractive alternative to traditional high touch, high-cost providers, allowing us to advance the market adoption of our platforms for ubiquitous connectivity.
As far as I know, and I’ve seen nothing yet to indicate otherwise, ANET is very much focused only on the SDN within data centers. They have no interest in:
-
high-capacity distributed internet, i.e. WAN connections,
At least not yet, though this may be a logical expansion segment for them someday. -
consumer electronics for home/personal use.
And by no interest, I mean AT ALL! The leadership of ANET is focused strictly on the large enterprise, cloud-titans, etc. The biggest threat here is Cisco. -
unified information technology
I’m not even sure what this means, but from the second paragraph above it seems to imply “ubiquitous connectivity”, which I’m guessing relates to their wireless business which is tightly integrated into their long-haul and edge devices.
From what I can gather, UBNT is looking to connect campuses, which may well be geographically dispersed. Or perhaps communities. They definitely seem very big on both wireless and video, neither of which ANET cares about. And the wireless is for long-haul connectivity where it’s more efficient to connect various towers than string cables. For example, they mention on their community site that We are deploying an internet system to a remote area of nepal covering roughly 600 square kilometers. There is no phone service here and no internet.
UBNT seems interesting. My big concern would not be ANET, but rather, how scalable is this company? This type of hardware is not only very expensive to develop, but equally as expensive to deploy and maintain, since it’s installed in hard-to-get-to places. A lot of it also seems to be outdoors equipment, which requires ruggedization, and at least occasional manual inspection. And “manual” is expensive since you need to pay people who are willing to go places most people can’t or don’t want to get to.
I would need to dig into them much more before I’d invest in them. ANET seems like a much better investment to me, though not without it’s own risks!
–
Paul - who’s recently a huge fan of ANET
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Returning to this thought, I note in today’s Arista release that they have made an acquisition in the wi-fi space.
“Arista today also announced that it will acquire Mojo Networks, the inventor of Cognitive WiFi and a leader in cloud-managed wireless networking. The parties expect to close the transaction in Q3 2018. “We are excited about Arista’s first acquisition transaction and its significance to Arista’s cognitive campus vision. We welcome the Mojo Networks employees to the Arista family,” stated Ms. Ullal.”
volfan84