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Andrew Skafel of Edgewater Wireless Systems Talks WiFi3 and the Internet of Things
Nov. 09, 2015 04:15PM PST
Cloud Investing
The Investing News Network got in touch with Andrew Skafel, president and CEO of Edgewater Wireless, to get more insight into the company’s WiFi3 technology and its new IOTair platform.
Last week, Edgewater Wireless Systems (TSXV:YFI) announced the launch of its IOTair™ Platform, the first internet of things (IOT) platform to use its WiFi3™ technology.
A spinoff of Edgewater Computer Systems — a defense industry R&D company that’s been around since 1988 — Edgewater Wireless has been making waves with its high-density WiFi solution for some time now. Though the company’s share price has stayed fairly flat for the past several years, it’s up roughly 175 percent since the start of 2015.
The excitement could be due to the sale of one of Edgewater’s patents to “a major handset and tablet manufacturer” earlier this year. Edgewater has not disclosed the name of the major manufacturer publicly, but it appears that the company interested in Edgewater’s technology is Apple (NASDAQ:AAPL).
In any case, it certainly seems to make sense to use Edgewater’s WiFi technology to support the ever-growing IOT. According to McKinsey, up to 30 billion units are expected to be connected to the IOT by 2020, and as Transparency Market Research notes, WiFi has been dominating the IOT space so far.
The Investing News Network got in touch with Andrew Skafel, president and CEO of Edgewater Wireless, to get more insight into the company’s WiFi3 technology and its new IOTair platform. Here’s what he had to say.
WiFi vs. WiFi3
The internet may be everywhere, but as Skafel explained, WiFi infrastructure hasn’t adapted quickly enough to ever-growing demands for internet access.
“It’s a technology that was developed for your home,” he explained. However, with smartphones and tablets, there’s demand for WiFi everywhere. With vendors using technology intended for private use in public places, there’s often too much demand on the system, resulting in poor connectivity and slow internet connections.
“It transitions from this really low-density application in the home to something that’s higher density,” Skafel added. Traditionally, WiFi uses a single channel, or single radio length. Skafel said that’s akin to a one-lane highway, which is not great for relieving congestion.
Edgewater’s solution to the problem is fairly simple: it uses three channels instead of one to allow more devices to connect to the same WiFi access point without bogging things down. That might seem straightforward enough, but Skafel stressed that developing the technology wasn’t so easy.
“In order to have multiple lanes, you have to deal with something called interference. Each of the channels on a radio will interfere with one another,” he said. “Our patent portfolio mitigates radio interference, so we have a very strong lock on that multi-channel [technology].”
Skafel wasn’t able to give too many details on how it all works, stating only that “it’s a combination of things that are part of our secret sauce.”
However, there are other factors that make the tech unique to Edgewater as well. “It’s one thing to have a patent. It’s a complete other thing to implement them,” he explained. “These patents are implemented in custom, high-performance silicon, which is very is very difficult to replicate. [That] gives us a good competitive barrier to entry.”
In any case, Edgewater’s technology is getting noticed. Skafel wasn’t able to speak much about the patent transaction mentioned above, but he did explain its importance for the company. “It wasn’t just a financial transaction,” he said. “We’re in the tech space, and we’ve now had one of the most significant tech players validate our core technology.”
Edgewater also announced a partnership with global connectivity platform supplier Zinwave this year, and Skafel said that WiFi3 will allow that company to deliver a greater capacity than what they could before.
WiFi3 and the IOT
As mentioned above, the IOT is growing rapidly, and all of that change can come with major growing pains. Large numbers of smartphones and personal computers connecting to a WiFi network are one thing, but with lights, thermostats and other IOT devices to manage as well, congestion issues may get out of hand.
That’s where Edgewater’s “multi-lane road” capability comes in. “We’ll use one of those lanes for your Nest [thermostat], and we’ll keep your iPod or your laptop on some of the other lanes. So you get the maximum performance out of it, you’re not slowed down by all the devices or all of this traffic,” Skafel said.”
Further illustrating that point, Skafel explained that Edgewater’s new IOTair platform will also aim to address problems connected to IOT beaconing.
“In a congested environment, we’ve done testing that shows that, with as few as five or 10 devices, those devices beaconing and trying to connect to a single-channel access point will result in a 95 to 99 percent error rate because there’s only lane for them to connect to,” Skafel said.
“Let’s say you’ve got 10 devices in the house, and they’re all beaconing and all sending out these messages. That will absolutely overwhelm the capacity that you have. And this gets worse when you put it into a large enterprise environment, where your building operator might be controlling all their lights with IOT and the thermostats and the temperature sensors and things around in the building.”
Edgewater is targeting large enterprises and major service providers such as Telus (TSX:T) with its IOTair platform. “It’s a bit more high performance and robust than what you need in your house,” he said. “It’s not saying the whole market is not something where we’re applicable. Absolutely we are. But we’re also a premium product.”
Skafel did not provide any details regarding whether the company is in talks with Telus or any other large service providers at the moment, but he did state, “given that we’re in Canada it would make sense.” In Edgewater’s November 3 release, Skafel states that the company has signed non-disclosure agreements with “two of top five wireless equipment makers in the world to discuss partnership opportunities for WiFi as well as IOT applications and products.”
What’s next?
In terms of what investors can look forward to next from the company, Skafel said that it will continue to build its patent portfolio and to work towards “new partners” and “new wins with some larger recognizable brand names” under the company’s licensing and OEM business unit. He also stated that investors can look forward to further announcements with Edgewater’s existing partner, Zinwave.
Edgewater Wireless is up 450 percent over the past year — although it’s fallen roughly 21 percent in the past six months — and is currently sitting at $0.165 per share. It has a market cap of 21.61 million, and has traded within a 52-week range of $0.02 to $0.58.
Securities Disclosure: I, Teresa Matich, hold no investment interest in any companies mentioned.
Editorial Disclosure: The Investing News Network does not guarantee the accuracy or thoroughness of the information reported in the interviews it conducts. The opinions expressed in these interviews do not reflect the opinions of the Investing News Network and do not constitute investment advice. All readers are encouraged to perform their own due diligence.