WaveRider Communications Inc., a Canadian manufacturer of fixed wireless hardware, announced it will move its Calgary research and development operations to its head office in Toronto later this year.
“”It’s not a cost-driven initiative,””
WaveRider president Bruce Sinclair said. “”This year, we won’t save anything.””
The company made the move because it would cost less money to grow in one location than it two, Sinclair said, adding no date has been set for the move.
Sinclair said he doesn’t know whether any of the 14 Calgary-based employees will move to Toronto. Many have spouses that work in Calgary, and workers today aren’t as mobile as they used to be, he said.
Sinclair noted the company used to employ 70 at each of its Canadian locations, and planned to increase its head count to 200 in Canada. Now, the company has about 70 workers worldwide, 50 of whom work in Canada.
“”When you have a smaller organization, it’s really tough to have and justify two locations,”” he said. “”You have to have multiple telephone systems, multiple computer systems, facility managers, so you get a lot of inefficiencies with that sort of size of staffing.””
WaveRider’s product line includes the Last Mile Solution (LMS) 3000, a non-line-of-sight system designed to provide broadband Internet service in the licence-exempt 900 MHz spectrum.
Other WaveRider products include the Network Communication Link (NCL) series of bridges and routers, which are designed to provide transfer rates of up to 11 Mbps in the 2.4 GHz band. Earlier this year, the company announced it sold 500 NCL 1170 bridge/routers to Dubai, United Arab Emirates-based Crystal Information Technology, an integrator that provides network services in the UAE, Saudi Arabia and Oman.
Most of WaveRider’s sales are outside of Canada, Sinclair said. “”Our revenue, although small, is doubling,”” he said. “”We expect growth again this year.””
Financial data for the quarter ending Dec. 30, 2001 was not available at press time.
Revenues for the quarter ending Sept. 30, 2001 were US$1.7 million, up from US$1.2 million during the same period in 2000. WaveRider lost US$4.49 million during the quarter ending Sept. 30, 2001, down from US$15.8 million during the same period in 2000. Sinclair said the WaveRider plans to continue cutting costs and believes revenues will continue to rise.
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