On a mission: Amir Zoufonoun charts global territory for Western Multiplex - Company Business and Marketing

Communications News, Oct, 2000 by Sean Kelly

"We're an ideal platform to consolidate the industry," Zoufonoun says of Western Multiplex's business strategy. "We'll be one of the consolidators, and there will be a number of consolidation candidates." He looks for bigger companies to "come and consolidate the market again, and buy people like us. Our strategy is to be an interim consolidator in the wireless industry."

Zakin's sales and marketing experience will also play a key role in Western Multiplex's growth strategy. "He and a few other folks at U.S. Robotics wrote the book on distribution," Zoufonoun acknowledges of Zakin.

Western Multiplex is now boosting its sales force and pushing ahead with its international growth. The company has been "very strong" in the Asian and Latin American markets. "Our weak point has been Europe. We'll cover Europe through an acquisition, more than likely," Zoufonoun proposes.

The recent acquisition of Petaluma, CA-based Ubiquity Communications will give Western Multiplex a pointmultipoint system for its product lineup. The new system, still under development. will enable service providers, businesses and other enterprises to overcome last-mile bottlenecks. The yet-unnamed product will be rolled out at the end of 2001--which Zoufonoun says should interest "a lot of ISPs and emerging services providers." The company offers its products in licensed, as well as unlicensed, bands.

Another piece of the strategy puzzle is the long-term relationships Western Multiplex developed with mobile companies through Lynx--relationships that Zoufonoun reveals can be "leveraged" as those companies explore the fixed wireless market.

Zoufonoun says Western Multiplex will sustain its strong growth for another reason--the change in attitude he has seen among buyers, since his "mission" for Lynx back in 1992.

"We had high hopes more would show up because we had these cool gadgets," he remembers. "We believed in our story--but the willingness and openness on their part wasn't there at that time."

For Western Multiplex, however, persistence has paid off with a more open market. "Maybe a younger generation has come in on the buyers' and users' side, and you don't have the old traditional microwave user anymore in the industry," he speculates. "The younger generation is perhaps willing to try new ideas and new gadgets. That's the biggest change."