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05/04/2004: "WiFi switch shakeout/shakedown underway"

Fucked Company has the following reported fucks:

ReefEdge fucked

Vivato appears to be in serial layoff mode, but see below.

Aruba, Vernier, Trapeeze, Symbol and Airespace all have rumors posted, but I'm not in the mood to pay to see these.

Bandspeed doesn't rate at FC, but they're fucked anyway, since I've never seen these CEO transitions go well, and this is #3 for them. Moreover, their claimed "SDMA" is complete hype. I know one of their BoD members from way back when he and I were in charge of the IT and Engineering infrastructure at Convex, and several people who work there. This stinker can't last.

All of these companies will be gone in less than a year now that Cisco has launched its own WiFi switch. Extreme and Symbol will pickup any customer that doesn't want to buy Cisco's solution.

And finally Proxim has managed to avoid any mention, even though the stock continues to tank. Proxim is slated to ship a WiFi switch in July, though a half-dozen of their software team has fled to Vivato, who continues to outsource at least twelve would-otherwise-be-US-based positions to India.

Rumors say that few of the new crew don't know much about anything, and refuse to move to Spokane, which leads to a fractured development team. I predict utter disaster. Time will tell if the 802.11g switch, rumored to be introduced at N+I, will ship anytime soon.

Proxim and Extreme appear to be coupled in a stock slide. The same chart shows that Cisco and Symbol appear to be on a slow climb. Symbol, of course, has a huge play in barcode, which will save it from the high seas of the WiFi space.