Following the acquisition of Wilocity by Qualcomm Corp. (Nasdaq: QCOM), which sources believe was for about $300 million, Wilocity cofounder and CEO Tal Tamir spoke with "Globes."
Tamir: "It's a long road, and if you don't have big ambitions, you're wasting the time of your investors, your employees, and yourself. There's no other way than to think big, because what's involved is chips technology and creating a new standard for wireless communications. We arrived at a vision of developing Wi-Fi technology that can enter computers and telephones with a big appetite."
"We got advice"
According to Tamir, over a million chips with the new technology were already sold last year, and the main partners included Dell Computers and Microsoft. "This is an important achievement for a small startup: growing and entering as part of the computer of a manufacturer like Dell," explains Tamir, who was appointed VP following the acquisition, and will continue working at the company, together with the other cofounders.
About 100 Wilocity employees are expected to move from the company's development center in Caesarea to Qualcomm's development center in Haifa, and an aggressive employee recruitment campaign is in the works. "The employees are glad about the exit, because when you work with a given product for seven years, a group of experienced people is formed, few of whom have left. They're very glad to see that the company we built together is getting a high value, and they have an opportunity to push the technology into something bigger. There's a lot of positive energy here for meeting the challenge and entering the mobile worlds together with Qualcomm," Tamir says.
The long and fruitful cooperation with Qualcomm was what paved the way for the current acquisition. "It's hard to say how things ripened into an acquisition, but the long relationship was such that we shared things, got advice, and entered the market together," Tamir explains. "In general, small companies and startups have to maintain relationships with important partners in order to bolster their chances of penetrating the market. We were always a company that cooperated with an open mind.
"An acquisition is something you can't really plan, nor was it ever the plan and the goal. A combination of circumstances, such as the maturing of the mobile technology, was necessary in order to make the acquisition worthwhile for both sides."
According to Amir Faintuch, the senior Israeli at Qualcomm, who manages Qualcomm Atheros, under which Wilocity will work, and who visited Israel after the acquisition was completed, "As we see it, the acquisition has a huge upside from the Israeli perspective. The biggest thing that is going to happen to Wi-Fi is coming from Israel, and will continue to be developed in Israel. It's a tribute to the capabilities of the Israeli engineer." He added that in the second half of 2015, we will already see smartphones with Wilocity's high-speed Wi-Fi technology.
Incidentally, Qualcomm was not the only company interested in the technology developed by Wilocity in this field. "Companies always sit on the fence and evaluate both the technology and the company. When a company runs for seven years with technology that is essentially mainstream, it's obvious that the main players are looking at it," Tamir said.
Published by Globes [online], Israel business news - www.globes-online.com - on July 3, 2014
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