ACCESS Acquires Networking Company

Posted By: Ryan Friday, March 3, 2006 9:18:10 AM

ACCESS has announced its intent to acquire IP Infusion, a leading provider of intelligent network software for enhanced IP services, in a deal worth approximately $50 million USD. ACCESS says the technology from IP Infusion will become a core part of their next generation home networking technologies to develop media servers for use with future mobile devices.

IP Infusion will become a wholly owned subsidiary of ACCESS after the completion of the transaction, which is scheduled in early March and subject to the approval from IP Infusion's shareholders.

IP Infusion, established in 1999 and based in San Jose, California, provides a comprehensive set of Layer 2, Layer 3 switching and routing solutions, ZebOS, for networking equipment vendors (Foundry Networks, Ericsson, Fujitsu, Accton, etc.). Its product lines cover the majority of routing protocols used today including support for next-generation networking technologies such as IPv6 and MPLS. IP Infusion recently entered the home media server market, offering core networking software for home storage-equipped servers with Internet access.

ACCESS expects to extend its leadership in network environment where the ubiquitous Internet is soon to be a reality and to proactively advance the development of ubiquitous connectivity platforms that can connect and interlock various intelligent home appliances through home gateway. The superb expertise of IP Infusion in lower layers will complement ACCESS' strength in upper layers and bring ACCESS greater opportunities particularly in the intelligent home appliances market including mobile devices. ACCESS will aggressively continue providing new platforms for ubiquitous connectivity based on home gateway. In order to achieve the above objectives and meet the full-scale penetration of 3G mobile phones and home broadband, ACCESS has decided to make IP Infusion its wholly owned subsidiary.

“IP Infusion has a strong record of deploying its advanced routing and switching software worldwide in networking equipment for the enterprise, telecommunications and service provider markets,” said CEO Perry Constantine. “The combination with ACCESS provides IP Infusion with added resources to continue to execute on this focus while leveraging additional market opportunities for our technology suite.”

ACCESS will provide details of the financial impact of IP Infusion on outlook after the deal closes.

Thanks to David Beers for the tip.

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Okay, so they're going broad rather than deep

SeldomVisitor @ 3/3/2006 1:02:18 PM #

Wonder what sort of premium this was (is? will be?) over IP Fusion's yesterday value?

So let's see...phone OS that can interact with home systems better now due to both the home systems AND the phone OS enhancements.

Cell/WiFi switching on the fly?

Something more interesting?

$350+ million to do it?

RE: Okay, so they're going broad rather than deep

WareW01f @ 3/3/2006 3:36:20 PM #

I was thinking Palms talking to your stove at first too, but remember, Cobalt was about breaking out of the PDA mindset. PalmSource stated at the time that Cobalt could run on a device with no screen, or a device with full SVGA. Smart devices are on the horizon (a matter of time/money) when they come full force, what OS will they run? Better put, if you are a manufacturer of devices and you put out a resume for someone to code your interface, where are you going to look? WinCE is the first option visible (due to sheer marketing) WindRiver, or some linux varient, but then you have to rool your own GUI... Course if ALP is around, free development tools and a ton of developers used to the OS, that's a pretty good place to be. On top of that if you want to see to China/Japan/Korea and need support of the character set... (seeing as to you prolly an asian nation *doing* the manufacturing)

This fits like a glove with the way PalmSource was going before all this. The bonus will be being able to use my Palm as the God-Box to my house (something I do anyway :)

RE: Okay, so they're going broad rather than deep

hkklife @ 3/3/2006 4:44:41 PM #

While we're at it, I'd LOVE to see someone in the hardware biz (*COUGH, SONY or Panasonic, COUGH*) make a line of "smart" home entertainment (a couple of TVs, a suround sound receiver, DVD player or burner, a game console etc) devices that can all talk to each other via a simple/cheap interface (USB, ethernet, Rs232 etc). Yes, it's been tried before (S-Link, AnyNet, CompuLink, Dimensia etc but there were all inherently dumb devices).

Then have a programmable remote running ALP (imagine the LifeDrive formfactor with softer rubberized contours and a larger screen) and a smattering of hard buttons. You could download little PQAs or applets (for lack of a better term) for new device functionality (Playstation 3 or Location-Free functionality, for example). That'd be a great way for a company to be a licensee of Access without competing against the "other" licensees or Palm themselves.

This tech + Access/PalmSource's prior relationship with Sony & their diverse lineup of CE hardware would be a natural fit. Plus, it'd give Sony a leg up on the Chinese flat panel & DVD player manufacturers whom Sony cannot hope to compete with on price alone.

Pilot 1000-->Pilot 5000-->PalmPilot Pro-->IIIe-->Vx-->m505-->T|T-->T|T2-->T|C-->T|T3-->T|T5-->TX

RE: Okay, so they're going broad rather than deep

AdamaDBrown @ 3/4/2006 2:35:42 AM #

That would be cool. I'd love to be able to instruct my DVR to dump certain shows to my DVD recorder without my having to sit there and manually play them back.

RE: Okay, so they're going broad rather than deep

Dr Opinion @ 3/5/2006 8:00:42 PM #

> "...Then have a programmable remote running ALP..."

Duh! Why only run ALP on the remote?

*All* the smart devices should run ALP, right? :)

------
"People who like M$ products tend to be insecure crowd-following newbies lacking in experience and imagination."

Again?

Mauibro @ 3/3/2006 1:03:14 PM #

How the heck is Access so stinkin rich?

They apparently have deep pockets and some plan that goes way past what people think.
Something tells me they are laying low and are going to burst on the scene with something huge.

RE: Again?

Admin @ 3/3/2006 1:09:39 PM #

Well... According to Access, the NetFront browser recently surpassed 235 million deployments globally, on over 801 unique devices. That's a lot of licenses.

-Ryan

Here's an Idea...

Ironhide @ 3/3/2006 1:24:06 PM #

All of this makes me wonder what business they are in. Or more precisely, what business they think they are in.
why don't you get a functional ALP out first? Hmmm?

Hey here's idea, why don't they ship a functional APL system then worry about other businesses.

Unless they are hedging their bets.

RE: Again?

PenguinPowered @ 3/3/2006 2:42:33 PM #

You might want to find out what business Access is already in before you suggest that they're hedging their bets. IP Infusion is a better match to Access' existing business than PSRC was, and merely complements the strategy they outlined.

May You Live in Interesting Times

RE: Again?

Ironhide @ 3/4/2006 10:03:16 AM #

PP,

You are right, of course, but my comment was really one of focus. being a jack of all trades and master of none is not a recipe for success.

It is a recipe for divesture though...

RE: Again?

Dr Opinion @ 3/5/2006 8:03:15 PM #

> "...why don't you get a functional ALP out first?..."

Competitive Strategy 101...

What is harder and more important to your strategy:

(1) Developing a mobile linux distro for your browser, with your own special pretty launcher, and palmOS compatability

(2) Building trusted relationships with many of the most important technology firms in the world, Samsung (all new Samsung phones use NetFront), Sony (NetFront is in every PSP), Sony Ericson (ditto), NTT DoCoMo (obviously), semiconductor firms, home entertainment firms, etc, etc, etc.

:)

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"People who like M$ products tend to be insecure crowd-following newbies lacking in experience and imagination."

Correction

cervezas @ 3/3/2006 1:12:57 PM #

IP Infusion isn't a "home networking company." They develop a networking protocol suite that ACCESS just happens to want to incorporate into its own home gateway product. The attraction of IP Infusion's protocol stack seems to be two-fold: it supports a wide range of protocols and it can run on a cheap network appliance with an embedded system rather than requiring a PC server.

David Beers
Pikesoft Mobile Computing
Software Everywhere blog
www.pikesoft.com/blog

RE: Correction

Admin @ 3/3/2006 1:26:45 PM #

you're right, I just took the home portion out of the title.

RE: Correction

Dr Opinion @ 3/5/2006 8:26:22 PM #

Further, IP Infusion develops a home media-center server that can serve as a broadband gateway, and stream to your handset or in-car media system using secure protocols.

In the press release, ACCESS notes that the IP Infusion home-media server is much cheaper than comparable PC-based media servers.

Wow! ACCESS is not just going to thrash Microsuck in browsers and mobile tech: ACCESS is going to go head-to-head with Vista media center. :)

And I bet it will run ALP. :)

Sweet. :)

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"People who like M$ products tend to be insecure crowd-following newbies lacking in experience and imagination."

POS WebTV-style settop box?

hkklife @ 3/3/2006 2:25:15 PM #

Ah, so maybe we'll see a POS WebTV-style settop box? ;-)

If the price is right then it seems like a logical enough acquisition for Access-as long as it doesn't sidetrack further ALP development.

Pilot 1000-->Pilot 5000-->PalmPilot Pro-->IIIe-->Vx-->m505-->T|T-->T|T2-->T|C-->T|T3-->T|T5-->TX

RE: POS WebTV-style settop box?

PenguinPowered @ 3/3/2006 2:45:02 PM #

I think it's the other way round. ALP is a distraction from Access' main direction, but IP Infusion fits that plan like a glove. ;)

May You Live in Interesting Times

RE: POS WebTV-style settop box?

pascanu @ 3/4/2006 3:14:13 AM #

Or microwaves ovens runing PalmOS?! :-D

Handspring Visor -> m505 -> Zire71 -> Zire72 -> Treo650

RE: POS WebTV-style settop box?

Ironhide @ 3/4/2006 10:12:13 PM #

Penguinpowered wrote:

I think it's the other way round. ALP is a distraction from Access' main direction, but IP Infusion fits that plan like a glove. ;)

Holy cow you are right! I can't beleive that I didn't see that before. I wonder what their P & L is on a divsional level to support thier core strategy and Palmsource. Time to hit Lexus/Nexus...