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Cisco acquires July Systems for its location, analytics services
Cisco buys July Systems to add its cloud-based location services to Cisco's enterprise Wi-Fi platform. Also, Extreme and Ruckus launch improvements to their wireless LANs.
Cisco announced this week the acquisition of a company that provides cloud-based location services through retailers' Wi-Fi networks, while Extreme Networks and Ruckus Networks launched improvements to their wired and wireless LANs.
Cisco plans to use July Systems technology to improve its enterprise Wi-Fi platform for indoor location services. July, a privately held company headquartered in Burlingame, Calif., sells its product by subscription.
July Systems' platform integrates with a company's customer management system to identify people walking into a retail store or mall. The July software can then interact with the people through text messages, email or push notifications.
The system also continuously maps the physical location of retail customers and uses the information to calculate their behavior patterns. July Systems software can also send collected data to business intelligence applications for further analysis.
Before the acquisition, July Systems was a Cisco partner. The company made its location services and analytics available through the Cisco Connected Mobile Experiences. CMX is a set of location-based products that use Cisco's wireless infrastructure.
Cisco plans to complete the acquisition by the end of October. The company did not release financial details.
Extreme, Ruckus releases
Extreme Networks has introduced wired and wireless LAN infrastructure called Smart OmniEdge that incorporates technology Extreme acquired when it bought Avaya's enterprise networking business last year.
The latest release includes an on-premises version of Extreme's cloud-based management application, called ExtremeCloud. Both versions provide a single console for overseeing the vendor's wired and wireless infrastructure, including access points and edge switches. They are also engineered for zero-touch provisioning, enabling customers to configure and activate devices without manual intervention.
Other infrastructure additions include hosted software for radio frequency management on the wireless network, which in today's workplace has to serve a variety of devices, including PCs, mobile phones, printers and projectors. Automated features in the technology include access point tuning and optimization, load balancing and troubleshooting.
Smart OmniEdge utilizes Avaya's software-defined networking product for simpler provisioning, management and troubleshooting of switches and access points. Extreme has also added APIs to integrate third-party network products and hardware adapters that companies can plug into medical devices to download and enforce policies.
Extreme has designed Smart OmniEdge for networking a campus, hotel, healthcare facility and large entertainment venue. The company's wired and wireless networking portfolio incorporates technology from acquisitions over several years, including wireless LAN vendor Zebra Technologies, Avaya's software-based networking technology and Brocade's data center network products.
Extreme's acquisition strategy helped boost sales in its latest quarter ended in May by 76% to $262 million. However, results for the quarter, coupled with modest guidance for the current quarter, disappointed analysts, driving its stock down by 19.5%, according to the financial site Motley Fool.
Meanwhile, Ruckus Networks, an Arris company, released a new version of the operating system for its SmartZone controllers for the wired and wireless LAN. SmartZoneOS 5 provides a central console for controlling, managing and securing Ruckus access points and switches.
SmartZoneOS customers can build a single network control cluster to serve up to 450,000 clients. The controller also contains RESTful APIs, so managed service providers can invoke SmartZoneOS features and configurations.
In February, Ruckus launched SmartZoneOS software that provides essential management and security features for IoT devices. The software works in conjunction with a Ruckus IoT module plugged into the USB port on each of the company's access points.
