Next week Legra Systems of Burlington, Mass. will be announcing their wireless
switch platform, the latest in the glut of WLAN switches announced in the last
few weeks from startups like Airespace
and Trapeze Networks
and established players like Extreme Networks
and Nortel.
Legra isn’t talking product specifics yet, but while giving a basic introduction
to it’s architecture, the company said it hopes to set itself apart by making
WLAN switches "boring."
That’s the word from Paul DeBeasi, Legra’s vice president of marketing and
product management. After doing market research with over 250 potential customers,
they came to the conclusion that the WLAN switch "debate is around the
wrong issues. Smart access points versus switches, aggregation versus switches,
the frequency spectrum, the security issues — based on our feedback, that’s
not what customers care about. Customers say ‘WLANs should be boring.’ Just
like a wired network."
To answer that, Legra is building a traditional Layer 2/3 switch, with wireless
controls built in. The switch will control Legra Radios, a series of light access
points that the company calls "intelligent antennas."
The switch will run Legra’s extensible Wireless Operating System (WOS). This
Linux-based OS is embedded in the switch and will allow for fast upgrades to
facets of WLANs that are changing rapidly, such as security standards. It can
be controlled using the Legra Manager system or through a secure Web browser
connection. They expect to be able to add third-party software functions to
the switch, citing solutions from companies like Newbury
Networks (location enabling) or Funk Software
(802.1X authentication) as potential examples.
"Our architecture lets the customer leave their existing switches and
radios with no changes," says DeBeasi. "We’ll allow them to introduce
our switches and radios anywhere on the network. Our radio can go to the switch,
or their existing switch. It’ll communicate with the existing switch. That degree
of freedom means the existing network and its switches and radios, aren’t impacted.
When you introduce the Legra solution you can put them on any switch you want."
The Legra switch uses a tech they call Radio Remote so it can sit anywhere on
the IP network to control the "tens of radios and hundreds of users"
per switch.
The company will include a "radio planning application," a site survey
tool that will looks at the Legra Radios and other access points on the network,
even interference sources, to provide an indication of where they should be
placed.
The company is not worried about being another start-up in this realm — their
research claims that customers will buy from anyone providing what they want.
"Security and performance are the primary purchasing criteria for customers,"
says DeBeasi. "But when you strip away all the geek-speak, they’re really
looking for a solution that plugs in, is boring, and just works."
