Aruba To Acquire Azalea In $40 Million Deal

Aruba Networks reported Monday that it is acquiring Azalea Networks in a move that will beef up Aruba's outdoor mesh offerings as well as provide Aruba with a new operations center in Beijing.

Aruba said the acquisition terms call for a total consideration of $27 million in stock and up to $13.5 million in cash over two years.

"This acquisition brings our customers and prospects innovative new solutions for real-time outdoor applications like video surveillance," said Aruba COO Hitesh Sheth in an e-mail, noting that Azalea has shipped more than 25,000 mesh nodes to more than 140 companies worldwide. "Outdoor networks need to cope with a wide range of environmental factors, and this challenge is compounded when video and voice need to be sent over long distances in real-time," he said.

Aruba noted that, combined with robust 802.11n, mesh can represent a more favorable alternative than wired networks in many applications, particularly in rapidly emerging outdoor apps.

"Enterprises have primarily focused WLAN deployments on indoor spaces, but outdoor applications loom large," said Matthias Machowinski, an analyst at Infonetics Research, in a statement. "Emerging applications like smart grid and video surveillance are going to accelerate outdoor wireless infrastructure deployments by enterprises in the coming years."

Aruba has focused much of its latest effort on cloud computing and networking. The company added that it will integrate Azalea's mesh products into its AirWave OnDemand software-as-a-service application, which is cloud-based and housed in secure Aruba data center facilities.

Noting that Aruba has operated in China for years, Sheth said the Azelea acquisition represents a substantial increase in its commitment to the Chinese market. The new China operations will work with Aruba's existing research and development resources in Bangalore and Silicon Valley.