06-07-2022
Rumbles in 5G OpenRAN Within Parallel Wireless: Why a Start-up Innovator Needs to be Adaptable to Stay the Course And Well Funded To Fight Another Day
The market is indeed a great leveler and this rule applies universally - be it a start-up with a few hundred engineers or a large behemoth with a billion-dollar revenue for a specific product line. This episode brings together two unconnected companies: Nokia and Parallel Wireless. Nokia's India operations in 2021 breached $1 billion Euro in net sales - entirely from the telco infrastructure play: RAN, Core, FTTH, transmission, IMS, enterprise solutions, and the works.
But it was not always so. Nokia which held a lion's share of the devices market -over 80% at one point in India went downhill, hitting rock bottom -about 22% market share within five years. And eventually adapted itself into a full-fledged infrastructure player after selling out the handset division. The prized lesson learned was adaptability.
In the case of Parallel Wireless, a pioneering innovator in the #open RAN, an unfortunate mix of market, timing, and funding may have created a flutter - so deep it may shake it up badly, it might make it to a point of no return. So what really went wrong?
It could have been markets targeted - mostly emerging markets in Africa, Brazil and so on which also became markets targeted by the big boys like Huawei. The other of course was running out of cash - in a global market scenario where risk capital is increasingly restricted due to a variety of geopolitical reasons.
The big takeaway -make sure that you are always ready to adapt: if the opportunity window has moved beyond your forecasted timeline, you need to have something else ready to keep the lights burning. When you are building disruptive infrastructure technology, you couldn't be over-funded - running a tight ship won't cut it.
Thank you for listening to another episode from Tonse 5G+. This podcast will bring you a weekly news wrap on the top developments in #5G, #enterprise 5G, and related business technology from #India. Follow me LinkedIn or on Twitter. If you are building a product and need marketing (go to market), lead generation, or strategy advisory, reach out to me,