PC-Tel Acquires Voyager

By Arik Hesseldahl -- Electronic News, 3/6/2000

PC-Tel Inc., a maker of soft modem technologies, said last week it will acquire Voyager Technologies Inc., Morgan Hill, Calif., a player in the world of wireless Internet Protocol and design, for $20 million in stock and cash.

Voyager specializes in Internet Protocol and reference designs for radio frequency (RF) silicon for both the Home RF and Bluetooth RF networking standards.

PC-Tel, Milpitas, Calif., said the acquisition will accelerate its ability to facilitate high-speed Internet access through cellular handsets.

"Voyager's design talent and core technology will help us quickly penetrate the wireless market segment," said Peter Chen, chief executive officer of PC-Tel. "We will converge our analog, embedded and DSL (digital subscriber line) modem technology with Voyager's Home RF and Bluetooth technology to deliver high-speed connectivity for everything from PCs and home networks to Internet appliances and other devices."

Steven Manuel, PC-Tel's vice president of marketing said the acquisition is being made with an eye toward integrating both Bluetooth and Home RF capabilities with data networking all onto a single chip.

PC-Tel's approach with modems has been to hand-off most of the processing duties to the PC processor, in combination with software, eliminating the need for digital signal processors and other semiconductor parts. The product takes up less space in the design of the PC, and requires less power. Among its customers is Compaq Computer Corp.

Recently PC-Tel has sought to extend the soft modem concept, which it calls Host Signal Processing (HSP), to the DSL market. In January it announced that its technology is compatible with the G.Lite consumer DSL standard, and is interoperable with the DSL infrastructure equipment of several vendors in that market. But the product is still in development, with samples of an ASIC-based DSL modem expected in June. Later, the company expects to ship an all-software DSL modem.

"We've proven we can extend the HSP idea to DSL, and now we're going to prove we can do it in the wireless realm," Manuel said.

Yoram Solomon, vice president of marketing for Voyager Technologies, said Voyager's role within PC-Tel would be to concentrate on design.

"As the only firm combining Bluetooth, Home RF and cordless telephony protocols, we have developed a strong customer base with companies such as Motorola, 3M and Veeder Root. Our new role within PC-Tel will permit Voyager to concentrate on design and to rely on PC-Tel's strong industry position to broaden the available market for our intellectual property."

Solomon said Voyager, founded in 1990, had products that closely resembled the Bluetooth 2.4GHz RF standard two years before the Bluetooth coalition of companies started its work.

"That put us in a good position to have Bluetooth products ready right away," Solomon said. "PC-Tel is going after the small office home office and home networking markets, and these are precisely the markets that we are trying to reach."

As a PC-Tel unit, Voyager will also continue to play in the merchant IP space, the companies said.

"Voyager's design talent and core technology will help us quickly penetrate the wireless market segment," Chen said. "We will converge our analog, embedded and DSL modem technology with Voyager's Home RF and Bluetooth technology to deliver high-speed connectivity for everything from PCs and home networks to Internet appliances and other devices."

Chen said examples of potential applications include cordless telephones, embedded wireless technology products, wireless headset technology, and other ISM (industrial, scientific and medical) products.