WiFi and cellular roaming vendor has named former Kineto boss Jeff Brown as its new CEO, as it raises $15 million for Hotspot 2.0 WiFi.

Sarah Thomas, Director, Women in Comms

September 24, 2014

2 Min Read
Accuris Raises $15M, Names New CEO

Accuris Networks, which powers the seamless authentication of Hotspot 2.0, has raised $15 million in capital and brought in a WiFi industry veteran to be its new CEO.

The company announced on Wednesday that Jeff Brown, former CEO of Kineto Wireless, will take on the Chief Executive slot at Accuris Networks plc . Brown left Kineto earlier this month, when it was acquired by Taqua LLC . (See Taqua Acquires Kineto for VoWiFi Push.)

Accuris, which provides roaming and handoff software for cellular and WiFi networks, has also completed a $15 million equity funding round from investors including Ulster Bank Diageo Venture Fund and the China Ireland Growth Technology Fund. This brings the private company's total funding to $23 million since it was founded in 2003.

For more on carrier WiFi strategies, visit Light Reading's dedicated WiFi page.

Accuris says it will use the funding to bolster its AccuRoam roaming platform and improve WiFi offload and roaming. It is also targeting growth in China, Japan and Asia, but is opening a new office in Silicon Valley to expand in North America, as well. Here, Accuris works with wireless operators including AT&T Inc. (NYSE: T), Bell Mobility Inc. and Telus Corp. (NYSE: TU; Toronto: T), but CTO Aidan Dillon says it's seeing more interest from the cable camp as well. (See Carrier-Grade WiFi Still 2 Years Away – CableLabs.)

The company provided the authentication and handoff technology behind AT&T's and Cisco Systems Inc. (Nasdaq: CSCO)'s trial of Hotspot 2.0 at February's Mobile World Congress. Dillon says the trial showed that when a device is able to automatically connect to WiFi without popups, passwords or extra steps, there will be significantly more WiFi usage than on non-Hotspot 2.0-enabled devices. (See Hotspot 2.0 Makes Slow & Steady Progress.)

"With Hotspot 2.0, WiFi behaves to the user as a base station would on GSM or CDMA, so you don’t have to care about who are you attached to," Dillon explains, adding that it works for voice calls and messaging too. "If you're buying a service from somewhere, it could be 3G, 4G or WiFi, and you don’t have to select it and figure out what it costs. It just connects."

The Wireless Broadband Alliance announced this week that 12 carriers have deployed Hotspot 2.0 across the globe, including AT&T, Boingo Wireless Inc. , Towerstream Corp. (Nasdaq: TWER), Time Warner Cable Inc. (NYSE: TWC), KT Corp. , NTT DoCoMo Inc. (NYSE: DCM), SK Telecom (Nasdaq: SKM), PT Telekomunikasi Indonesia Tbk. (Telkom) , Salt SA , Linktel and Etihad Etisalat Co. (Mobily) . (See WBA: 12 Carriers Deploying Hotspot 2.0.)

— Sarah Reedy, Senior Editor, Light Reading

About the Author(s)

Sarah Thomas

Director, Women in Comms

Sarah Thomas's love affair with communications began in 2003 when she bought her first cellphone, a pink RAZR, which she duly "bedazzled" with the help of superglue and her dad.

She joined the editorial staff at Light Reading in 2010 and has been covering mobile technologies ever since. Sarah got her start covering telecom in 2007 at Telephony, later Connected Planet, may it rest in peace. Her non-telecom work experience includes a brief foray into public relations at Fleishman-Hillard (her cussin' upset the clients) and a hodge-podge of internships, including spells at Ingram's (Kansas City's business magazine), American Spa magazine (where she was Chief Hot-Tub Correspondent), and the tweens' quiz bible, QuizFest, in NYC.

As Editorial Operations Director, a role she took on in January 2015, Sarah is responsible for the day-to-day management of the non-news content elements on Light Reading.

Sarah received her Bachelor's in Journalism from the University of Missouri-Columbia. She lives in Chicago with her 3DTV, her iPad and a drawer full of smartphone cords.

Away from the world of telecom journalism, Sarah likes to dabble in monster truck racing, becoming part of Team Bigfoot in 2009.

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