Casa Systems, Inc. operates as a global communications technology company.
With its physical, virtual and cloud-native 5G (fifth generation) infrastructure and customer premise networking equipment solutions, the company helps its CSP (communications service provider) customers transform and expand their public and private high-speed data and multi-service communications networks so they can meet the growing demand for bandwidth and new services. The company’s core and edge convergence technolo...
Casa Systems, Inc. operates as a global communications technology company.
With its physical, virtual and cloud-native 5G (fifth generation) infrastructure and customer premise networking equipment solutions, the company helps its CSP (communications service provider) customers transform and expand their public and private high-speed data and multi-service communications networks so they can meet the growing demand for bandwidth and new services. The company’s core and edge convergence technology enable CSPs and enterprises to increase network speed, add bandwidth capacity and new services, reduce network complexity, and reduce operating and capital expenditures regardless of access technology.
The company offers scalable solutions that can meet the evolving bandwidth needs of its customers and their subscribers. The company’s first installation in a service provider’s network frequently involves deploying its broadband products in only a portion of the provider’s network and, for its cable products, with only a fraction of the capacity of the company’s products enabled at the time of initial installation. Over time, the company’s customers have generally expanded the use of its solutions to other areas of their networks to extend network coverage or increase network capacity.
The company’s solutions are commercially deployed in over 70 countries by more than 475 customers, including regional service providers, as well as some of the world’s largest Tier 1 CSPs, serving millions of subscribers.
The company’s principal customers include Charter Communications, Rogers, Videotron, T-Mobile, Verizon, AT&T, Bell Canada, Cable One, Mediacom, Windstream, and Lumen in North America; Televisa/IZZI Mexico, Megacable Mexico, Cablevision Argentina, Claro Brazil, America Móvil and Claro Colombia in Latin America; Liberty Global, Vodafone and DNA Oyj in Europe; and NBN, Jupiter Communications, Beijing Gehua CATV Networks, Softbank, Kbro, Guangdong Cable, TRUE and CNS in Asia-Pacific.
Growth Strategy
The key elements of the company’s growth strategy are to continue to innovate and extend technology leadership through R&D investment; further penetrate existing customers; expand its customer base by expanding the breadth of solutions sold to customers; and invest in its platform through selective acquisitions.
Solutions and Technology
The company offers end-to-end cloud-native, virtual, physical and distributed infrastructure and customer premise network solutions that enable its customers to provide wireless and fixed-line broadband services to consumers and enterprises.
Wireless
Network Core
Virtual Evolved Packet Core (vEPC): Virtualizing the LTE EPC allows service providers to reduce network operating costs, improve network efficiency and deploy new services faster. Built from the ground up, the company’s vEPC is optimized for virtualized environments and implements control and user plane separation, or CUPS. It can be deployed stand alone or in conjunction with its other core network products, such as its Security Gateways and Small Cell Gateways.
5G Core: The company builts its 5G core, converged to support wireless and fixed-line broadband networks, to help service providers implement the shift from a single, one-size-fits-all core network toward a core that provides different logical networks, or ‘slices’, for different traffic requirements to support new use cases, including IoT, Enhanced Mobile Broadband, and Mission Critical Services. The company’s 5G core delivers several important features, including higher Gbps per vCPU; a solution deployable in containers with virtual machines, or VMs, or bare metal; location-independent placement of the control and user planes in a CUPS architecture; a smooth migration from 4G to 5G with efficient internal messaging between 4G and 5G network components; and network slicing in a service-based architecture.
Other elements of the company’s core infrastructure network solutions include its Security Gateway, which enables secure encrypted access for subscribers roaming between trusted and untrusted networks, while providing high levels of density and performance, and its Wireless Gateway, which enables routing and security functions, as well as traffic management, to provide secure connectivity for wireless endpoints and to enable broadband services, such as LTE over Wi-Fi, including Wi-Fi calling.
Small Cell Solutions
Apex Family of Small Cells: The company’s portfolio of indoor and outdoor Apex small cell solutions consists of remotely deployable access points that provide cellular connectivity services at the network edge in conjunction with transport security functions to address coverage and capacity challenges. These solutions allow CSPs to densify their networks while simultaneously improving coverage and enhancing throughput. The company’s small cell portfolio includes its:
Lifestyle residential small cell, the Apex Pebble, which uses the user’s broadband connection rather than a cell tower connection to provide wireless service in areas outside of the operator’s coverage areas. The company’s Apex Pebble offers unique features that include attractive design that is intended to drive better acceptance by subscribers and thereby provide better RF coverage than utilitarian-looking small cells that are likely to be hidden away in places that reduce radio frequency (RF) propagation; and untethered Wi-Fi backhaul option, versus the ethernet backhaul requirement in comparable traditional femtocells, which allows a user to place the device anywhere in his or her home where Wi-Fi is available without running or connecting additional cables to a home router.
Apex enterprise small cell with 4G radio capability, which supports two LTE carriers, in a small form factor.
Apex Strand solution, which is designed for both MSOs (multiple system operators) and mobile network operators, supports two LTE carriers (licensed LTE bands or citizens band radio service, or CBRS), and takes advantage of existing hybrid-fiber cable, or HFC, strand to help solve the power, backhaul and siting issues that accompany large-scale small cell deployments.
5G indoor small cell, which offers support for licensed LTE/5G bands and eventually CBRS and C-Band and is designed for environments with a large number of subscribers or where a larger coverage area is required. The company’s 5G indoor small cell helps its wireless customers meet the coverage and capacity challenges in dense urban and suburban areas where large numbers of NR and LTE devices are present. The 5G indoor small cell All-in-One package includes the baseband unit and the radio remote unit with flexible external antenna configurations. It also supports open radio access network defined interfaces for centralized and virtualized radio access network deployments.
Axyom Element Management System (AeMS)
The company designed its Axyom Element Management System to make small cell deployment and management more efficient for service providers as they expand and evolve their mobile access networks. The company’s virtualized AeMS provides full life-cycle management, which allows the provider to manage large scale deployments of small cells within complex network environments. It includes key management tools that facilitate integration with existing networks and increase radio access network utilization with zero-touch plug and play configuration of small cells. The Axyom Element Management System provides visibility and access to all modules from a single-pane-of-glass dashboard, which gives service providers the ability to monitor and control small cells efficiently and effectively. In 2020 the company expanded its AeMS to use cases beyond small cell deployment management and have connected its distribution point unit, or DPU. In future years, the company expects to add to its fixed wireless access solutions.
Fixed Wireless Access
The company’s Fixed Wireless Access (FWA), solutions enable service providers to offer fixed, ultra-broadband services to their customers where the service provider does not own copper, fiber or coaxial cable to the customer premise, or where these access media are not cost-efficient to deploy. Connections are instead serviced by a 3GPP (3rd Generation Partnership Project) compliant wireless connection in a manner that optimizes overall network efficiency and provides a higher grade of broadband service than would typically be achieved via a typical mobile handset. The company’s fixed wireless solutions support 4G and 5G, including its newly launched 5G millimeter wave Fixed Wireless Access device. These can be delivered as self-install indoor units or as pro-install outdoor units that are mounted to the side of the customer premise. The company designed its portfolio with a heavy emphasis on reducing the total cost of ownership for operators, achieved through class-leading hardware performance and build quality and its range of install accessories that optimize the installation process and overall install success rate.
Cable
The company’s solutions for cable service providers can be deployed in a centralized, distributed or virtual environment. While centralized deployments allow the company’s customers to deploy all critical converged cable access platform functions in a single location, distributed and virtual deployments enable its customers to densify the access network by distributing access deeper into the network, away from existing data centers.
Virtual Deployment
Cable service providers are actively evaluating virtualized versions of network functions, as well as software-defined networking control and orchestration to enable faster service creation and more nimble response to changes in service and bandwidth demand. In cable access networks, this trend is accompanied by fiber-deep strategies that push required ultra-broadband bandwidth closer to subscribers. The company’s Distributed Access Architecture, or DAA, solutions and virtual converged cable access platform, or vCCAP, create a secure, scalable, high-performance next-generation cable access network.
The company’s vCCAP provides all the features of its C100G CCAP on COTS servers in a flexible architecture that enables independent scaling of control and data planes. The company builts its vCCAP on its Axyom modular software framework for the cloud from the ground up. It delivers high performance and deployment flexibility in edge or core environments. The company’s virtual solutions also enable migration from physical network functions, or PNFs, to VNFs with a common management interface to both.
While the company’s customers continue primarily to rely on their existing i-CCAP infrastructure to provide gigabit broadband service to their customers, the company’s vCCAP and DAA products have been deployed by several of its customers, and as of December 31, 2022, the company was in over 70 trials with its customers globally.
Centralized Deployment
Integrated CCAP – C100G and C40G
The company’s C100G CCAP combines cable modem termination system, or CMTS, functionality, which enables IP data transport from data centers to end users over cable networks, including voice over IP, or VoIP, and edge-quadrature amplitude modulation, or Edge-QAM, functionality to enable video delivery over cable networks in one integrated chassis. The company’s C100G CCAP was the first solution offering full CCAP functionality, allowing the delivery of voice, video and data on a single platform. The company’s C100G CCAP also features high downstream speeds of up to 10 gigabits per second, high upstream channel capacity, and low space and energy consumption requirements. Using the company’s C100G CCAP, its customers whose networks are configured for DOCSIS 3.0 can adopt DOCSIS 3.1 through either a software upgrade or a simple line card addition, while continuing to service their customers who use DOCSIS 3.0 modems. The company is also able to increase capacity for its C100G CCAP through channel expansions, which are delivered via software-enabled increases in bandwidth capacity. The company’s software-centric approach will enable it to seamlessly provide its customers with future updates as standards evolve.
In addition to its C100G CCAP, the company offers its C40G CCAP, which provides per rack unit performance comparable to that of its C100G CCAP, but in a smaller form factor.
The company’s converged cable access platform (CCAP) solutions offer three key differentiating applications compared to a single cable network:
DOCSIS Core: Provides high-speed delivery of IP data for broadband connectivity services, including voice over IP.
Video Core: Delivers high-speed video processing, including for HD and 4K.
Intelligent Routing: Intelligently manages network traffic to optimize service quality.
Distributed Deployment
DAAs offer a new approach for service providers that are looking to increase capacity in their networks. The company’s family of DAA solutions is designed to help service providers push capacity to the network edge to improve the services their subscribers enjoy, extract more value from existing investments, and maintain smooth operations in the transition from centralized to distributed access architectures.
The company’s family of DAA solutions includes physical or virtual CCAP cores that deliver full CCAP and full spectrum DOCSIS 3.1 support and are compliant with CableLabs’ interoperability standards; the CCAP Service Card, or CSC, deployable in its C100G or C40G chassis, which provides the complete Data Over Cable Service Interface Specification (DOCSIS) and Edge-QAM media access control, or MAC, functions, as well as traffic aggregation for the DAA nodes or shelves; a range of DAA node and shelf form factors that perform complete DOCSIS and EQAM physical layer, or PHY, or MAC/PHY functions.
The company’s remote PHY, or R-PHY, solutions for cable networks retain software-driven network control and intelligence functions at the network core while placing physical layer functions remotely in a fiber node and the network edge. The company’s remote MAC/PHY, or R-MAC/PHY, solution for cable networks offers the capabilities of its R-PHY solution while also moving media access control functions from the network core to remotely deployed R-MAC/PHY nodes; and 10G Ethernet transport between the CCAP core and the DAA nodes.
Bandwidth Capacity Expansion
Software: The company’s customers can add additional bandwidth capacity to their converged cable access platform solutions by purchasing perpetual software license upgrades. The company’s software platform also permits additional features to be provisioned remotely, as compared to hardware-centric solutions, which require wholesale hardware replacements. As new standards and services evolve and broadband networks become increasingly virtualized, the company expects it will be able to deliver additional capabilities as software-only updates.
Line cards: The company’s customers may also purchase additional bandwidth in the form of its upstream and downstream line cards. The company’s line card expansion options allow its customers to rapidly add new service interfaces and physical connection capacity without the need for chassis replacements. In addition, the company’s expansion cards can enable support for its distributed access solutions utilizing the same C100G CCAP chassis.
Fixed-Line Broadband
Optical Access Solutions
Along with the company’s centralized and distributed deployment solutions, it offers a portfolio of Passive Optical Network, or PON, solutions for centralized and distributed PON architectures that enable service providers to move fiber closer to the network edge and deliver a broader range of ultra-broadband services more efficiently and at higher speed. The company’s PON solutions include next generation 10G EPON and XGS PON alternatives, including optical line terminals and optical network units. The company also offers a DOCSIS Provisioning over Ethernet system for seamless integration of its PON solutions with existing DOCSIS network protocols.
Virtualized Broadband Network Gateway Router and Multiservice Router
The company’s virtualized broadband network gateway, or vBNG, router provides advanced subscriber management and routing capabilities in a cloud-native, virtualized solution. By separating the control and data plane functions, the company’s vBNG enables elastic scaling and service agility, while allowing the service provider to put the control and data planes where they make most sense. Accordingly, the company’s vBNG can be deployed in either centralized architectures (on the same server in the data center or central office) or distributed ones (at the network edge or node closer to the end user). The company’s vBNG is deployed as a service on its Axyom NFV Framework. It is convergence-ready with built-in access gateway functions, or AGF, interfacing with its 5G core. The company supports data plane slicing based on service (converged/legacy) with dynamic control of the slice from its 5G core. At the 2019 Broadband World Forum, the company demonstrated how its vBNG and 5G core could enable subscribers to use services seamlessly as they move between mobile and fixed connectivity.
The company’s fixed-line broadband portfolio includes its disaggregated Multi-Service Router, or MSR. The company’s MSR is built on commercial off-the-shelf switching platforms that use merchant silicon. The company’s MSR supports the BNG data plane on merchant silicon. It offers industry-leading throughput and capacity in a one rack-unit form factor. The company’s MSR operates with the vBNG control plane being separated on a server at any centralized location or integrated right within the switch CPU. Service providers therefore can pick and choose the type of data plane at each location based on scale and throughput needs. The company’s MSR is also a full-fledged Provider Edge, or PE, router. It supports layer 2 multi-protocol layer switching and layer 3 virtual private networks with resource reservation protocol for traffic engineering and Fast Re-route, a technology to provide fast traffic recovery upon link or router failures for mission critical services. It also supports edge access functions. The company’s MSR therefore offers the functionality of a BNG, PE Router, and Top-of-Rack switch all rolled into one.
The company’s customers use its vBNG to support their next-gen PON and multi-access edge computing deployments. As an example, the company demonstrated an end-to-end solution using its G.fast DPUs and 10G XGS-PON ONTs working with its XGS-PON OLT-A product connecting to a multi-tenant vBNG. This solution offers a smooth migration path for telecommunications providers from digital subscriber line, or DSL, technologies to G.fast to fiber-to-the-home, while maintaining the same vBNG edge functions. Multi-tenancy allows customers to slice the same hardware infrastructure at the edge to different access methods based on service needs.
Fiber Extension (Fiber-to-the-Distribution-Point)
The company’s Fiber Extension (Fiber-to-the-Distribution-Point), or FTTdp, solutions allow service providers to extend the fiber running in the street or basement, utilizing the copper lead-ins at an end user’s premises. The solution consists of a distribution point unit, or DPU, which is installed outside of the home or in the basement of a multi-dwelling unit and a Network Connection Device, or NCD, which is installed inside the home. The company’s DPUs are reverse powered from the NCD when there is no power source available at the location of the DPU and where installing local power is costly and time consuming for the service provider. The company’s FTTdp solutions offer a cost- and time-effective means to provide a fiber-to-the-home experience to the end user and the operator, reducing time delays and cost overruns where the fiber penetration into buildings becomes problematic. The company’s portfolio focuses on cost optimization for service providers, with solutions ranging from software through to accessories that enhance the installation process.
Residential Broadband
The company sells residential broadband gateways for customer premises in Australia and New Zealand. The company added these devices to its product portfolio from its acquisition of NetComm Wireless Limited (NetComm). These devices allow customers to connect to very high-speed DSL, or asymmetric DSL, or fiber services, including fiber-to-the-node, -basement, and -home services when available. The company’s fixed-line broadband devices range from entry level gateways to high-performance devices that support triple-play services covering high-speed data transmission, multi-HD/4K IPTV and over-the-top video streaming, as well as high quality VoIP phone calls. The company combines the latest generations of Wi-Fi with its powerful CloudMesh portfolio of Wi-Fi mesh hardware, automated Wi-Fi optimization software and Wi-Fi analytics. These options ensure fast and reliable connections to multiple devices throughout the home and office, while also optimizing costs for the operator by reducing support call loading.
Machine-to-Machine (M2M) and Industrial Internet of Things (IIoT)
The company’s M2M and IIoT routers provide businesses and governments with networking products that are enabled for 3G and 4G/LTE data communication. The company designed these routers for applications, such as retail, transportation, health, metering digital signage, security, banking and mining. These solutions enable remote diagnostics, real-time monitoring, and wireless access via the Internet. The company’s routers are designed to withstand harsh environmental conditions and extreme temperatures. Dual file-system management enhances solution reliability, while integrated open-source software development kits enable customers to customize the company’s routers for specific-use cases.
Customers
The company’s solutions are commercially deployed in over 70 countries by more than 475 customers, including some of the world’s largest Tier 1 CSPs, serving millions of subscribers:
In North America: Charter Communications, Rogers, Videotron, T-Mobile, Verizon, AT&T, Bell Canada, Cable One, Mediacom, and Lumen;
In Latin America: Televisa/IZZI Mexico, Megacable Mexico, Cablevision Argentina, Net Brazil, America Móvile and Claro Colombia;
In Europe: Liberty Global, Vodafone, Telefonica and DNA Oyj; and
In Asia-Pacific: Jupiter Communications, Beijing Gehua CATV Networks, NBN, Guangdong Cable, TRUE and Softbank.
Sales and Marketing
The company sells its solutions and services through its direct sales force and in partnership with its resellers and sales agents. The company’s sales force is supported by its sales engineering team, which has deep technical expertise and the capability for product presentations, product evaluations, trials and customer care. Each sales team is responsible for specific direct end-customer accounts and/or a geographic territory across the following regions: North America, Latin America, the Asia-Pacific and Europe, the Middle East and Africa.
The company’s products typically have a long sales cycle, requiring detailed discussions with prospective customers about their network requirements and technology roadmaps. To help it succeed in a market characterized by long sales cycles, the company has developed strong customer relationships, which in turn provide it with insight into how its products will be deployed in its customers’ networks. The company involves product engineers in the sales process, enabling them to build relationships with customers that are valuable both during implementation and in post-sales customer support.
The company also uses resellers to market, sell and support its products and services, and it uses sales agents to assist its direct global sales force with certain customers, primarily in the Latin America and the Asia-Pacific regions.
Competition
The company primarily competes with larger and more established companies in the CSP market, such as Adtran, Cisco, CommScope, Ericsson, Huawei, Inseego, Nokia and Samsung, as well as a number of other suppliers of networking equipment and solutions to CSPs, such as Harmonic and Mavenir.
Research and Development
For the year ended December 31, 2022, the company’s research and development expenses were $85.2 million.
The company also seeks to enhance its technological innovation through its partnerships with industry standard-setting organizations and groups, such as CableLabs, 3GPP, and Wi-Fi Alliance.
Intellectual Property
As of December 31, 2022, the company held ten U.S. patents, with expiration dates through 2040, and had multiple patent applications pending with the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office. The company has also registered or applied to register various trademarks and service marks in the United States and a number of foreign countries, including for Casa Systems, NetComm and its four-triangle pyramid logo.
History
Casa Systems, Inc. was founded in 2003. The company was incorporated under the laws of the state of Delaware in 2003.
The Analyst Price Target shows the analysts’ low, high, and average target at a glance.
