MWC25 | Juho Sarvika, Inseego

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Juho Sarvikas

CEO

Inseego

play_circle_outline The Evolution of Connectivity: Inseego's Impact on Transition to Wireless Broadband Technology

play_circle_outline Inseego's innovative product announcements, including advanced 5G modems

play_circle_outline Examples of successful deployments in various industries, such as financial and retail

play_circle_outline Plans for future product development, such as enterprise-grade routing software

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Juho Sarvika, Inseego

Juho Sarvikas

CEO Inseego

Juho Sarvikas, an industry leader in wireless broadband and Chief Product Officer at Inseego, joins theCUBE's Savannah Peterson and Bob Laliberte at MWC25 Barcelona. Sarvikas shares his expertise in mobile and fixed wireless access and discusses the future of 5G as a primary connectivity solution for homes and businesses. With his insights, Sarvikas highlights the growing potential of wireless solutions in replacing wired connections, thanks to advancements in network performance and convenience.

Key takeaways include Sarvikas's observations on the e... Read more

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What does Inseego do as a company? add

What was the big announcement made by Qualcomm regarding the first 3GPP release 18 modem? add

What would be an example of a customer in the SMB or enterprise market that benefits from using the company's MiFi product and Inseego Connect cloud management platform for secure mobile connectivity? add

What software and cloud management platform will be used to target large enterprise and industrial markets for market expansion? add

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Savannah Peterson

>> Good afternoon, Cube community, and welcome back to Barcelona, Spain. We're here near the end of day three of our four days of coverage live on theCUBE. My name's Savannah Peterson, delighted to be doing this segment with Bob Laliberte. Bob, how's your day been so far?

Bob Laliberte

>> So far so good. Another action-packed day for us.

>> It smells like a really action-packed MWC.

Bob Laliberte

>> It was. 110,000 is what I'm hearing.

Savannah Peterson

>> Is that what they got? We were wondering

Savannah Peterson

>> what the number was. Oh, wow.

>> Yes, which is basically just another day at the

Bob Laliberte

>> Barcelona Football Club. But for the IT crowd, that's a lot.

Savannah Peterson

>> Great point. And there might be 110,000 people here, but we've got one of the coolest people here. Juho, thank you so much for taking the time out of your busy week.

Juho Sarvikas

>> Thank you for having me. Yeah, I can't believe it's day three already.

Savannah Peterson

>> I know, right? - Time flies

Juho Sarvikas

>> by when you're having fun, right?

Bob Laliberte

>> Absolutely. - It really does.

Savannah Peterson

>> And we are certainly about to have even more fun right now, so brace yourself. Inseego, just in case the audience isn't familiar, what do y'all do?

Juho Sarvikas

>> Inseego is an industry leader when it comes to wireless broadband. We do both mobile and fixed, or FWA as it's known. We've been leading in the latest and greatest in wireless for the past two decades.

Bob Laliberte

>> Excellent. Yeah. And when you're talking about that fixed wireless access, you're really drilling into how do you get that last mile to be freed from being untethered, I guess, if you will, from the fixed lines.

>> Yeah. You know what's super interesting? I'm actually

Juho Sarvikas

>> seeing wireless replacing wired. The ease of use benefit... We have a lot of customers that deployed wireless initially as a backup, but then after they saw the performance, the convenience of deployment, it became the mainstay, the primary form of connectivity. So I'm actually very bullish on where the industry is heading.

Bob Laliberte

>> That's great. And just to be clear though, when you're saying it's replaced, did you see that within 4G or has that really been a 5G phenomenon where people have said it's no longer our tertiary, it's now our primary?

Juho Sarvikas

>> Great question. There was a lot of discussion of what's the killer use case for 5G. Actually, it's still ongoing I think. My very simple answer, it's broadband for sure, because now the performance, and we'll talk more about that, I have some really cool stuff to show you, but now the performance of wireless connectivity is at a level where that can be a reliable single only broadband solution for your office or for your home.

Bob Laliberte

>> Excellent. - So you talked about how you're excited.

Savannah Peterson

>> What do you think are some of the big market dynamics going on right now? It seems like it's a bit of a moment for all of us.

Juho Sarvikas

>> Yeah. If you look at the wireless broadband, there's been a lot of deployments already, but it's really only starting. And the big thing is that it's been capacity constrained. So if you look at two different segments, you look at consumer deployments first, like your home internet, which even though you can't tell from the accent, I live in the US. So we've had a lot of deployments-

>> there.

Juho Sarvikas

>> New Jersey? - There you go. Southern California actually.

Bob Laliberte

>> Close. So we're seeing a lot of deployments.

Savannah Peterson

>> Companies like T-Mobile, Verizon, AT&T, millions of subscribers on FWA. But if you look at the economics of it, you can only deploy so much because your network capacity is your most valuable assets. You want to protect mobile, you want to protect other segments as well. But that's changing really quickly. I want to talk to you about 5G advanced while we're here on the air, but we'll get there shortly. That's going to be one of the solutions which will enable more deployment. But then in the business segment, it's a completely different economic equation because obviously you can extract a higher premium for a business that's more value that's created. So the business deployments are only starting now is my theory. So we're going to see a massive ramp up curve on FWA when it comes to business and enterprise segments.

Bob Laliberte

>> Yeah. - I think there's a lot of momentum there.

Savannah Peterson

>> I can't let us go on any longer in this broadcast without talking about the beautiful toys you brought for us. Tell us what's in front of you right now.

Juho Sarvikas

>> Thanks for asking. I was going to bring it up anyhow, so now it's more of a smooth transition.

>> Now it's less awkward? - So where to start?

Juho Sarvikas

>> We made two big announcements, super proud of the team.

Savannah Peterson

>> So first of all, Monday morning, Qualcomm announced the first 3GPP release 18 modem. The reason why that gets us excited is that it's the first instance of 5G advanced. So now you can have more carrier aggregation, higher performance, more network efficiency, so you can deploy better wireless broadband and you can deploy more. So our engineering team put that in an Inseego module. So we made our own module of the Qualcomm chip, which is this beautiful thing over here. And then in less than three weeks from receiving the early engineering sample, we were able to put it in a prototype fixed wireless access device and make a data call. So my claim to fame, and no one has challenged me the show so far, is that what we were the first OEM to make a 5G advanced data call on FWA.

>> That sounds good. I'm

Bob Laliberte

>> certainly not going to challenge you.

Savannah Peterson

>> I'll take your word for it. That was a little bit well, not only did you do that, you did that very quickly. Three weeks is not a very long period of time.

>> Yeah. So that's actually one of our many claims to fame

Juho Sarvikas

>> and why we think we will be an excellent partner of choice for the whole wireless ecosystem. We have an amazing engineering team in San Diego, some of the best antenna modem engineers in the industry. So our products are super when it comes to performance, reliability and all of that. But we're also really quick to iterate. We have a CTIA approved lab in San Diego, so it's not like, "Hey, we're going to design something, ship the design somewhere to get a sample, now take the sample somewhere else and get it tested. " We're actually doing it all in-house in San Diego so we can iterate super fast. And this announcement was really to demonstrate that we can be super fast, to your point, on the latest and greatest in wireless. The other announcement we made was two products. So this beautiful unit over here, this is our latest FWA, fixed wireless access, Inseego Wavemaker FX5000. I think I got the name right. And then our mobile hotspot, which also has the latest 5G advanced modem from Qualcomm.

Bob Laliberte

>> Okay. - So whether you have a fixed use case in your home

Juho Sarvikas

>> or office, or if you're a mobile worker, you can take that with you.

>> Got it. And are you finding more organizations,

Bob Laliberte

>> obviously the one you've got there in the middle, you're looking at retail stores potentially, right? Homes, things like that pop up. For the other one, mobile workers or also for home as well? Or is that more for mobile that it is home?

Juho Sarvikas

>> So our primary focus today is more SMB and enterprise. What I look forward to doing in the future is moving all the way to industrial. That's a super exciting segment. But if I look at our customer base, what would be a example? J.P. Morgan in the US, financial institute. So they have a lot of mobile workers or people working from home. They choose our MiFi product, the mobile hotspot for that, because it's secure. Not that you wouldn't have Wi- Fi at home already most likely, but this is secure. The enterprise can manage with our Inseego Connect cloud management platform, and their IT does not need to worry about anything. So that's one good example. The thing that I don't have here, because it's huge, we have this thing that I call a pizza box. So an outdoor FWA, it's a bigger antenna, amazing product. Tractor supply in the US... It turns out people who buy tractors tend to live on a farm or more remote area. So you get as good of a signal.

Savannah Peterson

>> I grew up on a farm. You're very much speaking my language, and I actually learned how to drive on a tractor. So you just tapped into some very small town roots of mine.

Juho Sarvikas

>> Yeah, more street credibility than I do.

Savannah Peterson

>> Well, here we go. I'll confirm or deny what you're about to say right now.

Juho Sarvikas

>> So we went in first with a normal indoor unit to solve the customer's problem. They quickly discovered that they're not getting strong enough reception. So that's when then we had our evaluated reseller partner show up and install an outdoor FWA unit. We ended up deploying over 2,000 of those. And this is actually the case example where the initial use case, if you will, was just to have a backup. They already had wired connectivity, but they couldn't afford any downtime. But then when it was all said and done, our outdoor FWA unit performed better than the wired connection. So they basically cut the cord and now it's all wireless. It was pretty awesome.

>> That's fantastic. That's all the tractor supply stores?

Juho Sarvikas

>> Huh? - That's to all the tractor supply stores,

Bob Laliberte

>> their retail outlets where they have-

Bob Laliberte

>> That's right.

Bob Laliberte

>> So that's good. This weekend when I go home, I'm going

Juho Sarvikas

>> to go to my local tractor supply and I'm going to see if I can see the pizza box outside.

Juho Sarvikas

>> Please send me a picture. - I

Bob Laliberte

>> will. I'll take it and send it to you.

>> Also, if you need a pizza box

Juho Sarvikas

>> of your own, you know where to find me.

>> I do. Absolutely.

Bob Laliberte

>> That's awesome. It's great.

Savannah Peterson

>> When you design for remote situations like that, it doesn't exclude anything that's not as remote. It makes it better for everything in general. Anyone can use the pizza box. Also, now I'm craving pizza, guys. Thanks a lot. Really appreciate this.

>> I had a pizza for lunch.

Juho Sarvikas

>> Yeah. Was that because you wanted to stay on brand?

Juho Sarvikas

>> Yeah, pretty much. - Yeah. I mean, this is awesome.

Savannah Peterson

>> You mentioned you're in Southern California,

Savannah Peterson

>> you've got Qualcomm all over this, Qualcomm HQ obviously down in San Diego. Talk to me about that partnership and how you get to develop together. And has physically being near them increased your ability to iterate faster?

Juho Sarvikas

>> Yeah, sure it does. We have our engineers in the Qualcomm office every day and vice versa. Excellent relationship. Fun fact, I was actually working for Qualcomm still two months ago.

Bob Laliberte

>> That's right. - So I left Qualcomm on a Friday

Juho Sarvikas

>> and I started at Inseego on a Monday and it's the building right next door to it. So I found it very funny. My commute didn't change, nothing changed. I was previously the president for Qualcomm North America.

Bob Laliberte

>> Yeah. - Oh, that's awesome.

Juho Sarvikas

>> And I actually knew the

Savannah Peterson

>> company because they were my customer.

Savannah Peterson

>> So you've had a couple fun moments at building K then, yeah?

Juho Sarvikas

>> Yes. Very well done. Yeah. - OG, that's the-

Juho Sarvikas

>> I can see building K from my office window.

Savannah Peterson

>> Oh, cheers.

Savannah Peterson

>> Well, next time, we're doing a beer at building K then when I'm in San Diego. That'll be great. Bob, I'll fill you in on that little inside joke. That's just for the if-you-know-you- know folks out there at home.

>> By the way, we name our the internal code

Juho Sarvikas

>> names, they're breweries in San Diego. We have Carl.

>> Oh, I love that. - We have Carl.

Savannah Peterson

>> Well, that's perfect because that

Juho Sarvikas

>> makes sense being able to see-

Savannah Peterson

>> You know what? This is actually Carl.

Juho Sarvikas

>> No kidding? - Yeah, yeah, yeah. It's the X85

Juho Sarvikas

>> modem is Carl, internal

Savannah Peterson

>> Okay.

Juho Sarvikas

>> I'm not sure- - Pizza and beer.

Bob Laliberte

>> Wait, exactly. Bob, you read my mind.

Savannah Peterson

>> So I was going to say, okay, so we absolutely have

Savannah Peterson

>> to do a show with pizza and beer and all this fun hardware.

>> If you'll have me next time, we'll do that.

Juho Sarvikas

>> Next time we'll do that. - Yes. No, absolutely.

Savannah Peterson

>> Absolutely. - Oh, my gosh, that would be super fun.

Savannah Peterson

>> Wow, this is a really exciting time.

Bob Laliberte

>> So you're obviously able to develop things very quickly.

Bob Laliberte

>> What's next? What's on the horizon for you?

Juho Sarvikas

>> So we have already today excellent hardware and a cloud management platform. There's a couple of areas that I want to invest in and continue to develop. So first of all, from a hardware standpoint of view, I mentioned that we're going to go to large enterprise and industrial, which is a segment that's going to be a very meaningful market expansion for us. And I think we can help the customers a lot, solve their problems with basically everything that I just explained. So to build towards that future and get those customers, we're going to build, I guess we're announcing it now, a RouterOS, H RouterOS. So enterprise-grade routing on the device software. But that is closely coupled with our Inseego Connect cloud management platform, which is also an area where we'll continue to develop new features. So that's key. In addition, you'll see us announce more... We have some industrial routers today, but there's going to be more of that. And then from a go-to-market standpoint of view, I look forward to continuing our presence in the marketplace, having more of our amazing sales folks train the carrier sellers as well as the value-added resellers. So that's really what I'm looking forward to accomplishing over the next, say, 18 months.

Savannah Peterson

>> It's a lot of community building.

Juho Sarvikas

>> Yeah, for sure. - And I think that's so important,

Savannah Peterson

>> especially in in this world and, well, in the chip land. It takes a lot of people to get this stuff over the line. How big is the Inseego team?

Juho Sarvikas

>> A little over 200 people.

Savannah Peterson

>> Oh, so that's actually still pretty lean.

Juho Sarvikas

>> Yeah. Yeah, yeah, yeah. - So that's an interesting...

Bob Laliberte

>> You talked about moving next door and I was going to ask you, so Friday, Monday, and then on Tuesday, were you back in as a customer?

Savannah Peterson

>> Yeah. - Yes, yes. The folks on

Juho Sarvikas

>> Qualcomm's side got a call. I was asking for some commercial terms, like

Bob Laliberte

>> Got it. And so one of the other things that would be really interesting I'd like to understand, so you had this great role at Qualcomm. What made you decide to go over to Inseego? What was so compelling that you saw that said I've got to be a part of this?

Juho Sarvikas

>> Bob, that's a great question. I was an OEM before joining Qualcomm, and I always really enjoyed the end market intimacy. So you get to feel the customer, you really get to understand the customer, and I've done that as a mobile OEM. I grew up with Nokia, we run our own OEM company. It was an element of going back to my roots, to be honest. Secondly, we're talking about the market opportunity. At the vantage point that I have had at Qualcomm, I was convinced that this is going to be a stellar place to go and create something new, build a real value, high quality product. I mentioned the go-to-market. It's just a beautiful opportunity to go and create value, create value really. The other thing is that I knew the Inseego team, the engineering team is top notch and it's just fun when you're working with the best in the industry and you can be leading the pack.

>> And you get to build cool stuff.

Savannah Peterson

>> You mentioned the tractor supply store and a few other examples. What are some of the other maybe intriguing use cases that you're really excited to design for?

Juho Sarvikas

>> I would mention failover. That's not a new thing necessarily, but disaster recovery. Let's say that you have hurricanes, some natural disaster. You can have 5G failover. So basically you can use one of our products. We have actually one in market now where you can have your cable modem or fiber modem, ethernet port in into our box and ethernet out into the access point that you are already providing. Our solution will sense if there's no data connectivity and immediately snap into without the end user ever knowing that that happened. It's been popular, but I think it's getting more popular from what I'm seeing. It's also something that in the enterprise segment, there's a lot of demand for it. Again, you're having a retail store, to go back to that... Our chief revenue officer is called Steve, so we call everything Steve's pizza shop, if you're going back to the pizza story again.

Savannah Peterson

>> I love - When it comes to...

Juho Sarvikas

>> And customer examples. So you don't want your point of sale to go down.

Savannah Peterson

>> Absolutely not. - So it's great value even if you have a

Juho Sarvikas

>> wired connectivity to have that failover, which is again the same motivation as with the tractor supply initial use case as an example. So that's definitely a growing segment for us as well.

Savannah Peterson

>> You're doing some really cool stuff. Juho, I have one last question for you. I am still impressed that you started two days after you left Qualcomm. You deserve a vacation at some point, young man. But what do you hope to be able to say at Mobile World Congress next year that you can't yet say today?

Juho Sarvikas

>> I really think it's the scale of our deployment. I really like everything that we discussed here. I think we have a great strategy. We know what we're doing on product, our product team rock solid, in addition to our engineering team. It's really to execute on this. So I would hope to be here, give you a lot more of very compelling customer and customer examples. So hopefully I get the opportunity to do that with you.

Bob Laliberte

>> Well, I'm expecting the next time you come back, it won't only be supplying tractor supply, you'll be having all your 5G FWAs on the tractors themselves.

Juho Sarvikas

>> When -

Savannah Peterson

>> Absolutely. - ...

Juho Sarvikas

>> they're great industrial use case, vehicle mounted, if you will. Keep going on a tractor as well. I'll think about that.

Bob Laliberte

>> Absolutely. - I love this. Well, I look forward

Savannah Peterson

>> to hearing all of those fantastic customer stories over pizzas and beers the next time we get to reunite and talk tech. Juho, thank you so much for taking the time to be here with us.

>> Really appreciate it. Thank you so much.

Savannah Peterson

>> Yeah, absolutely. And thank you, Bob.

Juho Sarvikas

>> I appreciate you letting me join you on this one. This has been-

>> This is great. Thank you.

Savannah Peterson

>> This has been a blast.

Bob Laliberte

>> And thank all of you for tuning in to our wonderful and insightful four days of coverage here at Mobile World Congress in Barcelona, Spain. My name's Savannah Peterson. You're watching theCUBE, the leading source for enterprise tech news.