Cambium Networks has a very strong presence in India with a commitment to connect hundreds of thousands of people and places through its Point to Point and Point to Multipoint RF solutions that provide wireless connectivity such as for rural broadband, public hotspots. Headquartered in Rolling Meadows, IL, outside Chicago, and with R&D centers in the U.S.; Ashburton, England and Bangalore, India, the company is fully committed to our partners because we know how vital they are to the successful delivery and deployment of our solutions to end customers. In an exclusive chat with Channel Times, Rajiv Kapoor, Vice President, Cambium Networks explains the company’s India-specific plans, channel presence and business roadmap for the coming quarters. Excerpt.
CT: Please tell us about your company’s presence in the Indian market in recent months
Rajiv Kapoor: Our pursuits are closely aligned with Digital India initiatives particularly as a wireless connectivity enabler in the overall value chain – encompassing urban and rural areas both. Our contribution towards this is through partnerships with Government Agencies, Facebook Express and leading ISPs such as TCL, Tikona, ACT broadband.
Our engagement in India goes beyond the telco service providers and includes players from sectors as diverse as Education, Hospitality, Oil & Gas, Manufacturing, Wind Farms, Mining, Transportation and many more.
In the new age digital world, Cambium Networks’underlying philosophy is driven by the passion to connect people, places and things to the unending opportunities created by IoT, increasing bandwidth consumption, streaming video, and a world of new data. Converging the aspects of last mile and end-user experience, ensuring LastSmileConnectivity is the unsaid promise of Cambium Networks.
CT: What are some of the interesting or key installation projects that you have participated in recently over the past year?
Rajiv Kapoor:We derive rich inspiration from the ground-breaking multiple success stories base that we have quickly built in India within a very short period of time. Our ‘people, places and things’themehas resulted in enabling wireless connectivity across the regions of Mount Everest base camp to scorching heat of the desserts of Rajasthan or the tough terrains of hilly areas such as Himachal Pradesh, Meghalaya, Uttarakhandand also the plains of Uttar Pradesh.
Being partners to country’s leading ISPs and telcos, our solutions have also been part of many mission critical events of national pride like KumbhMelaPrayagraj 2019, Bangalore Airforce Air show 2019, Chennai Stadium for IPL season 2018 & 2019, Global Entrepreneur summit in Hyderabad, Goa. We have also jointly built success stories with India’s leading educational institutes such as IIM Sambhalpur, Sambhalpur university, Central Academy for Police Training (CAPT) at Bhopal, Mayo College Ajmer to name a few. Among our hospitality clients are Sahara Star Hotel, Mumbai and Radisson Hotel.
CT: What is your distribution model?
Rajiv Kapoor:We are a partner centric organization and our value-added distribution network ensure optimum value sell to our customers. Our Sales team works closely with partners and customers to achieve highest level of satisfaction.
CT: What are your expansion plans?
Rajiv Kapoor:Cambium Networks’ recorded phenomenal growth in India in the last fiscal period and we are confident as well as on the path to continue growth. In terms of manpower expansion, our sales team and global development center in Bangalore witnessed added resources and strengths. We are in the phase to enhance our reach in tier 2 cities and SAARC countries. While the Engineering & Development team is on an ever increasing mode, we are also working towards a state of the art lab to be setup in Bangalore to enhance user experience with quality products that undergo rigorous QA and other tests.
CT:What new categories do you plan to enter?
Rajiv Kapoor:While we continue to penetrate further in enabling rural broadband connectivity under the purview of Digital India, we are upbeat on the Bharat Broadband’s Digital Villages project that has a pan-India focus. Additionally, we are exploring projects in the Defence segment apart from strengthening our presence in Hospitality, Multi Dwelling Units like hostels, old age homes, room aggregator apps such as OYO or AirBNB and Retail. Warehousing is also emerging as a growth potential with strong demand for solutions pertaining to wireless connectivity, Wi-Fi for handhelds, CCTV surveillance over RF and Wi-Fi.
CT: What are some of the major tech trends you have observed in the marketplace?
Rajiv Kapoor:We are observing industry consolidation for a more reliable and scalable end to end one roof solution. Also, customers are now relying more on Cloud-based solutions to avoid in-house IT setup and reduce maintenance expenses.
CT: What do you think are the reasons towards the trending?
Rajiv Kapoor:The trends are in line with the overall needs of modern businesses namely on the aspects of agility, scalability, sustainability, cost optimization, business excellence, mobility to name a few.
CT: What are the bottlenecks in technological advances in India? What are the underlying problems and how can we address them?
Rajiv Kapoor:Although we are growing much faster on technological advancements in all the domains now, there are certain issues that are left to be overcome. Particularly in RF/Wi-Fi industry benchmarking of quality and performance is required so as to ensure e best quality service. The Make in India focus should lead to development of best-in-class technology and products. There are certain regional alternatives available that not only compromise on performance but also on data security.
CT: What is your roadmap for the next 12-18 months in India?
Rajiv Kapoor:We will keep focusing on connecting the unconnected through RF or wireless and continue to contribute in any opportunity to provide last mile connectivity. We will enhance our contribution in Defense connectivity, Rural broadband, Hospitality, Education, Retail, Corporates, Power, Water and Transport through our Reliable, secure and affordable solutions.