Aruba Networks

Aruba, a Hewlett Packard Enterprise company

Type	Subsidiary
Industry	Computer networking
Founded	Sunnyvale, California, USA (2002)
Headquarters	Sunnyvale, CA
Key people	Dominic Orr, President and CEO Keerti Melkote, Co- Founder & CTO Pankaj Manglik, Co- Founder & Past CEO
Revenue	US$600M (FY 2013)[1]
Operating income	US$-32.6M (FY 2010)[2]
Net income	US$-34.0M (FY 2010)[2]
Total assets	US$251M (FY 2010)[3]
Total equity	US$151M (FY 2010)[3]
Number of employees	1,200 (2012)
Parent	Hewlett Packard Enterprise
Website	www.arubanetworks.com

Aruba, a Hewlett Packard Enterprise company, (formerly "Aruba Networks, Inc.") is a networking vendor selling enterprise wireless LAN and edge access networking equipment.^[4] The company has over 1,800 employees and is headquartered in Sunnyvale, California. Aruba's core products are access points (APs), mobility controllers, and network management software through their Airwave Management Platform product.

According to the Dell'Oro Report published in Q211, Aruba ranked #2 in market share in the wireless LAN market.^[5]

In May 2009, the company introduced the Virtual Branch Network (VBN) family of products targeting branch offices and remote locations.

Gartner has positioned HP and Aruba as a leader in their 2015 Wired and WLAN Access Infrastructure Magic Quadrant Report. According to Gartner, “the combination of HP's wired switching line with Aruba's WLAN and mobility products creates a strong access solution.” ^[6]

In Gartner’s own words: ”In 2015, HP acquired Aruba Networks. The combination of HP's wired switching line with Aruba's WLAN and mobility products creates a strong access solution. When measured by 2014 revenue, this deal combines the No. 2 campus switching vendor with the No. 2 WLAN vendor. We anticipate that the new division will continue to leverage the HP internal switching line, but will promote Aruba Network's WLAN portfolio and ClearPass to be the flagship WLAN and policy management software, while Aruba's AirWave and HPE's Intelligent Management Center (IMC) management applications will be merged. Clients globally should consider HPE (Aruba Networks) for all wired/WLAN access layer opportunities.“

According to Gartner’s 2015 Critical Capabilities report, Aruba Networks, a HP company, led all of the wireless LAN access categories and with the addition of HP’s Ethernet switching line, was a close 2nd in wired only. This shows how the unified organization offers industry recognized leading solutions for networking.^[7]

Corporate history

Aruba was founded in 2002 by Keerti Melkote and Pankaj Manglik. The company was venture backed by Sequoia Capital and Matrix Partners. In 2005, it entered into an agreement to provide OEM equipment to Alcatel-Lucent.^[8] Aruba went public in March 2007. It acquired the wireless security business of Network Chemistry later that year. In 2008 it purchased AirWave Wireless, a vendor of wireless network management software.^[9]

Aruba was first to market with purpose-built 802.11ac AP and has the second largest market share of 802.11ac APs.^[10]

On March 2, 2015, Hewlett-Packard announced that it would acquire Aruba for $2.7 billion.^[11]

On May 19, 2015, HP completed the acquisition of Aruba Networks for a transaction value of $3 billion. Aruba is now wholly owned by HP and has been combined into the HP Networking business within HP’s Enterprise Group organization.^[12]

Hardware

Aruba offers Wi-Fi-branded products such as access points, wireless controllers and software. Aruba sells products under their own brandname and as OEM products from other vendors, such as the Dell PowerConnect W-series products and Alcatel-Lucent OmniAccess products.^[13]

Access Points

Wireless access points from Aruba are targeted at the corporate market and support the IEEE 802.11n and IEEE 802.11ac standards. Some APs can use external antennas both for improved indoor-coverage or outdoor usage. One model AP is weather-proof to be used with up to 4 external antennas. All Aruba access points offer ARM: Adaptive Radio Management, integrated security features, integrated spectrum analysis and support mesh features for campus-wide deployment. Aruba APs can be centrally managed by Aruba Mobility Controllers or deployed as controllerless Aruba Instant APs that are managed in the cloud.^[14]

Instant Access Points

The Aruba Instant solution uses a dynamically-elected access point to distribute a network over the air. There are five AP series and three Remote Access Point series that offer: Adaptive Radio Management (ARM) technology, built-in security features, easy set-up and software updating, and no deployment limits.^[15]

Mesh Routers

Aruba offers 3 models of mesh-router. These mesh-routers are access-points with integrated OSI layer 3 routing and support Wi-Fi access as well as point-to-point, point-to-multipoint and full mesh backhaul. Most models are to be used with external antennas.^[16]

Remote Access Points

For small branches or working from home Aruba offers RAPs: Remote Access Points that communicate with Aruba's Mobility Controller. There are several RAPs: small single-radio AP's, a wired-only device and multi-user wired/wireless models.^[17]

Mobility Access Switches

The S1500, S2500 and S3500 Mobility Access switches are 12, 24, or 48 port Power over Ethernet (PoE) switches for use with Access Points. Management can be done via a dedicated out of band 10/100/1000 Mbit/s Ethernet port.^[18]

Mobility Controllers

Mobility controllers are used for a central organization-wide management of all access-points and users. For smaller environments APs with built-in controllers are available for up to 512 users. For larger organisations Aruba offers the 6000 series for up to 20 Gbit/s total bandwidth or the 7200 series with a maximum of 32,768 users. The controllers offer access authentication, managed encryption, radio-spectrum analysis and firewall-features.^[19]

Cloud Services Controllers

In March 2015, Aruba introduced the 7000 series Cloud Services Controllers combines wireless, wired and WAN services, supports up to 24 Ethernet ports and 64 APs, and features integrated WAN compression, health checks, zero-touch configuration, and policy-based routing. The 7000 series also integrates with Microsoft's Lync Server 2013 mobile unified communications (UC) solution, via certification for Lync software-defined networking (SDN) API.^[20]

Antennas

Some Aruba access-points can use external antennas. A wide range of indoor and outdoor antennas are available, supporting different frequency-ranges, directional and omni-directional.^[21]

Software

Aruba has software-products for use with their hardware. Aruba's own operating system runs on all Aruba access-points and mobility controllers.

ArubaOS

ArubaOS runs on the Mobility Controllers. As additional components RFProtect + WIP^[22] and a Policy Enforcement Firewall^[23] are available.

Network access control and policy management

Based on today's GenMobile workforce and the propensity to carry multiple devices, Aruba ClearPass allows administrators to create policies that include authentication workflows with authorization privileges per user and/or device. Hardware and virtual server options let any SMB or large enterprise to differentiate access for employees, contractors, guests, students regardless of industry or access method - wired, wireless or VPN. The support of multivendor network infrastructure at the enforcement level ensures that ClearPass works in any environment - Aruba, HP, Juniper, Arista Networks, Brocade and even Cisco.

Enterprise RADIUS and TACACS services ensure a clean cut-off of legacy AAA that do not deliver policy, profiling and other built-in services required for today's GenMobile user behavior. Free API and syslog message interoperability (ClearPass Exchange) delivers a fast and simple way to ensure that existing mobile and perimeter security tools (firewalls, MDM, SIEM...)can be leveraged during an entire user/device connection. EcoPartners include Palo Alto Networks, MobileIron, AirWatch, IBM, HP, Splunk and others.

^[24]

Add-on features include Guest, Exchange, Onboard and OnGuard:

• Guest offers self-service and sponsor approved guest-registration via web portal for structured Internet connectivity for visitors. Via the portal, authorized (non-IT) staff can then allow a guest to access the network (Internet or parts of the LAN).
• Exchange delivers a fast, simple way to ensure that existing mobile and perimeter security tools (firewalls, MDM, SIEM) can be leveraged during an entire user/device connection.
• Onboard provides the ability for users to self-register and configure personal devices for managed access on secure enterprise networks. A built-in CA allows for EAP-TLS-based certificate access to eliminate active directory management for BYOD.
• OnGuard ensures that laptops and/or computers meet posture requirements before gaining access to enterprise resources. Example include requiring that the latest anti-virus software is installed, USB devices and P2P apps are not running while connected to the enterprise network, etc.

Network management

AirWave is Aruba's network management platform. It includes three components to deliver the core capabilities for managing a network: operations management with AirWave Management Platform (AMP), visualization and location tracking with VisualRF, and rogue and intrusion detection with RAPIDS, AirWave's Rogue AP Detection Software.^[25] AirWave is a multi-vendor multi-architecture tool. It supports wired and wireless infrastructure from manufacturers such as Aruba, Cisco, Motorola/Symbol, and others.^[26]

Meridian Mobile App Platform (SaaS)

Meridian-powered apps use location-over-Wi-Fi data to send personalized push notifications to mobile devices and offers indoor turn-by-turn directions.^[27]

Other software

Aruba offers other applications such as an outdoor RF planner^[28] and mesh-config for configuration of the mesh routers.

Acquisitions

• On 01/09/2008, Aruba Networks Enters Multi-Vendor Network Management Business With Agreement to Acquire AirWave.
• On 05/10/2010, Aruba Networks Targets the Outdoor Industrial Enterprise With the Acquisition Of Azalea Networks.
• On 12/14/2010, Aruba Networks Announces Purchase of Amigopod Assets and Technology.
• On 12/08/2011, Aruba Completes Acquisition of Avenda Systems.
• On 05/16/2013, Aruba Networks Maps Out New Indoor Location-Based Services with Acquisition of Meridian.

References

External links

• Aruba Networks
• Corporate Blog - Aruba Atmosphere
• Airheads Social Online Community
• Altai Technologies - Super WiFi