Atheros ships more than 100 million wireless LAN chipsets

(Business News & Technology News, 26 Feb 2007)

Atheros Communications Inc. announced that it has shipped more than 100 million wireless LAN (WLAN) chipsets to date. In 2006, Atheros enjoyed an extraordinary year with 64% revenue growth to $301.7 million, punctuated in the fourth quarter with the company's seventh quarter of consecutive growth. The eight-year old company shipped more than 40% of the 100 million cumulative WLAN chipsets during the last year.

Atheros' recent WLAN chipset milestone is due in part to the company's commitment to delivering industry-leading single-chip 802.11g and 802.11a/g solutions, and the unmatched performance of its XSPAN(TM) draft 802.11n family of solutions. During 2006, Atheros also began shipping its 802.11g and 802.11a/g ROCm(TM) (Radio-on-Chip for Mobile) embedded solutions, targeted to dual-mode cellular handsets, low-cost VoIP phones, mobile gaming devices, cameras, camcorders, music players and PDAs with market-leading WLAN capability.

While greater than 50% of the company's fourth quarter WLAN revenue was derived from its 802.11g solutions, over 20% came from its new generation XSPAN 802.11n products. The company's customers are shipping a wide variety of Atheros-based draft 802.11n products with more than 50 SKUs in the market today. With the recent stabilization of the 2.0 draft and the advent of end-product certification by the Wi-Fi Alliance to begin mid-year, Atheros anticipates the adoption of 802.11n products will continue to grow.

Another factor contributing to the company's core business in 2006 was the increased adoption of WLAN technologies in the carrier and gateway market. Atheros' single-chip 802.11g solutions are currently featured in designs from five of the top broadband gateway providers worldwide. As 802.11n is accepted in the carrier market, these solutions will provide unmatched ability to deliver triple play and IPTV services throughout the home.

"The 100-million chipset milestone signifies our employees' continued commitment to making Atheros the leading provider of the industry's highest performance wireless communications products," said Craig Barratt, president and CEO, Atheros. "While Atheros' success to date has come from its wireless LAN expertise, the company is extending its technical leadership into the Bluetooth and Ethernet markets to meet the growing needs of our world-class customer base."

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