Tarana Wireless, a start-up based in Santa Clara, California, raised $88 million in new funding for its fixed wireless solution for suburban broadband.
Tarana claims its fixed wireless access technology, which uses unlicensed spectrum, will drive a tenfold improvement in the network economics of gigabit broadband access. The company developed its own silicon for advanced interference cancellation.
The funding round includes a $60 million financing with Khosla Ventures and EchoStar Corporation, as a follow-on to financing of $28m led by 1010 Holdings, LLC, the family offices of Greg Wyler. In conjunction with the financing, EchoStar Chairman Charlie Ergen, Khosla Ventures partner Samir Kaul, and Greg Wyler, Chairman of OneWeb, have joined Tarana’s board of directors. Kranti Kilaru recently stepped down from his role as EVP at EchoStar to join Tarana’s leadership team as President. Tarana has now raised nearly $200 million to date.
Company founder and COO Sergiu Nedevschi stated, “We are excited to complete this round of financing, which allows us to finish our product development efforts and start commercial trials with a number of tier 1 operators who are now making plans for that phase.”
Samir Kaul said, “We’ve evaluated many companies who have tried to solve the world’s broadband problem with fixed wireless. We believe Tarana is the only one that has developed the technology required to consistently deliver the affordable gigabit bandwidth that both consumers and businesses worldwide are demanding.”
Greg Wyler added, “Tarana has the lowest-cost and highest-capacity solution for suburban residential users everywhere, whether that is the US, Europe, Africa, South America, or Asia. Tarana’s access network enables mobile operators and ISPs to leapfrog fiber to the home and quickly provide equivalent performance at a fraction of the cost. This is a great complement to OneWeb’s rural capabilities and fits perfectly with the mission to bridge the digital divide.”
