GoAhead Software today said it is shifting its business model and technology strategy from its proprietary SAFfire product to an open source software model. In addition, the company is acquiring Avantellis from Emerson Network Power.
The Bellevue, Wash.-based company hopes the moves will further boost adoption of commercial off-the-shelf (COTS) software in industries such as wireless, media, defense and other markets.
In the past, GoAhead was a proponent of proprietary software, but now the company believes that OpenSAF has reached the degree of quality, performance and scalability to meet the carrier-grade requirements of big wireless infrastructure and service providers, according to Bill Yaman, vice president of sales and marketing at GoAhead. OpenSAF has won the support of industry players like Ericsson, Wind River and Huawei, and it made sense for GoAhead to join the party, he says.
GoAhead did not disclose the financial terms of the Avantellis acquisition. With it, GoAhead will almost double in size, from 53 to 97 employees, and have a team based in India.
In conjunction with the move to open source, GoAhead formally announced that it is joining the OpenSAF foundation. GoAhead will contribute key components of its SAFfire middleware to OpenSAF, and company President Asif Naseem will join the OpenSAF foundation as a board member.