Mellanox Technologies

Mellanox Technologies Ltd.
Public
Traded as NASDAQ: MLNX
Industry Communication equipment
Founded 1999 (1999)
Founder Eyal Waldman, Shai Cohen, Roni Ashuri, Michel Kagan, Evelyn Landman, Shimon Rottenberg, Eitan Zahavi, Udi Katz, Alon Webman
Headquarters Sunnyvale, California, U.S.[1][2]
Key people
Eyal Waldman, CEO
Products Ethernet and InfiniBand switches
host bus adapters
Revenue

Increase US$658,1 Million (FY15)[3]

Increase US$463.6 Million (FY14)[4]
Increase US$118.31 Million (FY12)
Increase US$111.38 Million (FY12)
Number of employees
2900 (March 2017)
Website www.mellanox.com
Mellanox Headquarters in Yokneam Illit

Mellanox Technologies is a multinational supplier of computer networking products using InfiniBand and Ethernet technology. Mellanox offers adapters, switches, software, cables and silicon for markets including company data centers, cloud computing, computer data storage and financial services.

History

1999–2009

Mellanox was founded in 1999 by former executives of Intel Corporation and Galileo Technology (which was acquired by Marvell Technology Group in October 2000 for $2.8 billion[5]) Eyal Waldman, Shai Cohen, Roni Ashuri, Michael Kagan, Evelyn Landman, Eitan Zahavi, Shimon Rottemberg, Udi Katz and Alon Webman.[4] Eyal Waldman founded Mellanox in the Israel city of Yokne'am.[6] Initially founded as an integrated circuit (chip) manufacturer, it evolved into a producer of complete end-to-end systems by 2009.[7] The company raised over $89 million in 3 financing rounds of venture capital.[8][9]

The company went public in 2007, with an initial public offering on NASDAQ that raised $102 million, and valued the company at over half a billion dollars.[10] Created in 2009, Mellanox's investment fund was publicly launched in 2014.[11]

2010–present

In 2010, Oracle Corporation became a major investor in the company, holding around 10% of its stock.[8] Oracle uses InfiniBand technology in its Exadata and Exalogic appliances.[12] Stock shares were also listed on the Tel Aviv Stock Exchange, until 2013 when the company de-listed itself, but remained on NASDAQ.[13]

In February 2011, Mellanox acquired Voltaire Ltd., a provider of data center switches for about $218 million.[14][15]

In 2016, Mellanox Technologies began to employ programmers in the Gaza Strip, in addition to its team of Israeli Arab programmers and programmers in Ramallah and Nablus.[16] In 2016, Mellanox had revenues of $857 million.[6] In December 2017, Mellanox announced it would start a new startup accelerator.[11] Over 2017, shares in the company rose by 55 percent. That year, the company also made its largest acquisition with EZchip.[6]

Boardroom in 2018

The activist investor Starboard Value LP purchased a 10.7% stake in the company in November 2017.[17] After acquiring 10.7% , Starboard wrote a letter to the company stating that Starboard attributed the company's "underperformance compared to other semiconductor companies" to "a pattern of weak execution that has included both excessive spending and missed growth opportunities." The letter called for "substantial change."[18][19] The day after, on January 9, 2018,[20] Mellanox announced it would immediately discontinue its 1550 nm silicon photonics development activities, with president and CEO Eyal Waldman saying the review of the silicon photonics business had started in May 2017.[21] Mellanox also said it would fire 100 people, all in the US. At the time, the company employed 2,900 people, mostly in Israel.[20]

In a "board battle,"[22] in January 2018, Mellanox sent a letter to shareholders asking them to entirely replace the board of directors.[23] On January 17, 2018, it was announced that Starboard was aiming to remove the entire board at Mellanox Technologies. At the time, Mellanox had a $3.3 billion market value.[17] Starboard said it would nominate nine candidates for election to the company's board, including Starboard head Jeffrey Smith.[24]

Acquisitions

In 2013 Mellanox acquired certain assets of XLoom Communications Ltd., including opto-electric chip-scale packaging, as well as hired XLoom's technology personnel. In July 2013, Mellanox acquired privately held Kotura, Inc., a developer of silicon photonics optical interconnect technology for high-speed networking.[25] In July 2013, Mellanox acquired privately held IPtronics A/S, a designer of optical interconnect components for digital communications.[26]

In July 2014, Mellanox acquired privately held Integrity Project, for its software connectivity, low-level development, real-time applications and security technology.[27] In February 2016, Mellanox acquired publicly held EZchip Semiconductor, a provider of network processors and multi-core processors from EZchip's earlier acquisition of Tilera.

Manufacturing

Mellanox is a fabless semiconductor company.[28] The current generation of its chips are produced by Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Corp.[29]

Products and market

Mellanox Technologies provides InfiniBand and Ethernet switches for servers and storage used in enterprise data centers[30] and also makes its own integrated circuits to support the InfiniBand protocol.[15] Mellanox offers interconnect products: adapters, switches, software and silicon for a range of markets including high-performance computing, enterprise data centers, Web 2.0, cloud, storage and financial services.

In 2010, a press release from Oracle described Mellanox as "the premier switched fabric provider for enterprise data centers and high performance computing". According to the same press release, Mellanox's InfiniBand technology is faster, more scalable and provides higher throughput than alternative communications technologies.[31] Larry Ellison, CEO of Oracle, promoted Mellanox’s main technology, InfiniBand.[7]

  • SwitchX is a multi-protocol ASIC that handles both InfiniBand and Ethernet traffic.[29] It builds on the older 90 nanometer architecture of ConnectX technology, originally developed by Mellanox to support both Ethernet and Infiniband on one chip.[10] SwitchX is the fifth generation, using a 40 nanometer process with 1.4 billion transistors on a 45mm by 45mm chip.[29]
  • ConnectX-3 is a 10/40GbE adapter for VMware ESXi 5.0 that provides virtual protocol interconnect, meaning it can run 10 Gigabit Ethernet, 40Gb Ethernet, or Infiniband at up to 56Gb per second from the same card.[30] ConnectX-4 and ConnectX-5 adapters have enhanced capabilities.[32][33] The ConnectX architecture has been described as "novel", with excellent performance that is "very well suited for modern multi-core platforms."[34]

High-performance computing

Mellanox Technologies' InfiniBand products for computer clusters have been deployed in many of the TOP500 list of high-performance computers.[35] They provide high performance and some include a TCP offload engine.

Storage

Mellanox also promotes its products for storage area networks.

Customers

As of 2011 Mellanox derived more than a quarter of its revenues from two large customers, Hewlett-Packard and IBM.[36] Intel Corporation accounts for over 2% of revenues.[37] As of June 2011, Oracle owns 10% of Mellanox and is also a major customer.[38] Other customers include Chevron, Viacom, JPMorgan, Comcast and Airbus.[39]

Hiring practices

Mellanox outsourced some of its engineering to the West Bank. Rather than setting up offshore engineering centers in the Far East or Eastern Europe, Mellanox hired Palestinian engineers from Ramallah through a Palestinian outsourcing firm.[40] In 2018, Waldman told a Tel Aviv conference hosted by Globes magazine that over 100 Palestinians are working on Mellanox projects.[41]

Waldman had previously talked about Mellanox's plans to build a research and development center in Ramallah, even though it is more expensive than outsourcing to Eastern Europe.[42]

Awards and recognition

  • In November 2012, Mellanox was named one of the Fastest Growing Companies in Deloitte's 2012 Technology Fast 500 Rankings.[43]
  • In November 2012, Mellanox was awarded - 'Readers’ Choice: Best HPC Interconnect Product or Technology' from HPCwire[44]

See also

References

  1. "Mellanox office locations". Mellanox Technologies.
  2. "Mellanox Technologies". Linkedin Corporation.
  3. "Mellanox Achieves Record Quarterly and Annual Revenue". Mellanox Technologies. 2016. Retrieved 2016-01-27.
  4. 1 2 "Corporate Overview" (PDF). Mellanox Technologies. 2015. Retrieved 2011-10-29.
  5. "Marvell to acquire LAN-chip supplier Galileo for $2.7 billion in stock". eetimes.com. 2000-10-17. Retrieved 2011-06-12.
  6. 1 2 3 Solomon, Shoshanna (December 26, 2017). "When a startup gets big, the environment gets rougher, says Mellanox CEO". The Times of Israel. Retrieved January 20, 2018.
  7. 1 2 Ackerman, Gwen (January 5, 2011). "Mellanox CEO Sees Sales Rising 10-Fold With Voltaire". Bloomberg. Retrieved 2011-10-29.
  8. 1 2 Tsipori, Tali (September 25, 2011). "Oracle acquires $11m more Mellanox shares". Globes. Retrieved 2011-10-29.
  9. Kovar, Joseph F. (February 11, 2002). "VC Money Continues To Drain Into InfiniBand: Mellanox Secures $56M". CRN. Retrieved 2011-10-29.
  10. 1 2 Walko, John (February 8, 2007). "Mellanox raises $102 million with IPO on Nasdaq". EE Times. Retrieved 2011-10-29.
  11. 1 2 Habib-Valdhorn, Shiri. "Mellanox to launch startup accelerator". Globes. Retrieved January 20, 2018.
  12. Bagh, Carl (October 29, 2010). "Oracle buys 10 pct stake in Mellanox, will Dell, HP, IBM follow suit?". International Business Times. Archived from the original on November 12, 2010. Retrieved 2011-10-29.
  13. "Mellanox Technologies Initiates Process to Delist Ordinary Shares from Tel Aviv Stock Exchange". Press release. May 30, 2013. Retrieved April 23, 2017.
  14. "Mellanox Technologies, Ltd. Completes Acquisition of Voltaire, Ltd". Press release. February 7, 2011. Retrieved April 23, 2017.
  15. 1 2 Timothy Prickett Morgan (November 29, 2010). "Mellanox gobbles up Voltaire for $218m". The Register. Retrieved April 23, 2017.
  16. Mellanox Hires Programmers in the Gaza Strip
  17. 1 2 Benoit, David (January 17, 2018). "Starboard Value to Launch Proxy Fight for Entire Board at Mellanox". The Wall Street Journal. New York City, New York. Retrieved January 18, 2018.
  18. Solomon, Shoshanna (January 8, 2018). "Activist investor Starboard calls for 'substantial change' at Israel's Mellanox". The Times of Israel. Retrieved January 20, 2018.
  19. Venugopal, Aishwarya (January 8, 2018). "Starboard says chipmaker Mellanox's 2018 targets insufficient". Reuters. Retrieved January 20, 2018.
  20. 1 2 Solomon, Shoshanna (January 10, 2018). "Mellanox to cut 100 US jobs as chip line development halted". The Times of Israel. Retrieved January 20, 2018.
  21. "Mellanox to cease 1550nm silicon photonics development". optics.org. January 10, 2018. Retrieved January 20, 2018.
  22. Schacknow, Peter (January 18, 2018). "Stocks making the biggest moves premarket: MS, WMT, WWW, LQ, AAPL, AA & more". CNBC. Retrieved January 20, 2018.
  23. Ray, Tiernan (January 18, 2018). "Mellanox, Under Siege From Starboard, Surges 6% on Q4 Beat, Outlook". Barron's. Retrieved January 20, 2018.
  24. Starboard to nominate nine candidates to Mellanox board, Reuters, January 17, 2018, retrieved January 20, 2018
  25. "Mellanox Technologies, Ltd. Completes Acquisition of Kotura, Inc". NASDAQ. Retrieved Aug 15, 2013.
  26. "Mellanox Technologies, Ltd. Completes Acquisition of IPtronics A/S". NASDAQ. Retrieved Jul 1, 2013.
  27. "Mellanox Technologies Ltd. Announces Definitive Agreement to Acquire Integrity Project". NASDAQ. Retrieved June 24, 2014.
  28. "Web-chip fabless Mellanox poised to raise $50m at company value of $250m". TheMarker. October 30, 2001. Retrieved 2011-10-29.
  29. 1 2 3 Morgan, Timothy Prickett (April 26, 2011). "Mellanox uncloaks SwitchX network switch-hitter". The Register. Retrieved 2011-10-29.
  30. 1 2 Amodio, Michelle (October 6, 2011). "On the Road with Mellanox Technologies". TMCnet. Retrieved 2011-10-29.
  31. "Oracle Corporation Makes Strategic Investment In Mellanox Technologies, Ltd". Oracle. October 27, 2010. Retrieved 2011-10-29.
  32. "Mellanox Infiniband Cards Overview".
  33. "Mellanox Adapters - Comparison Table | Mellanox Interconnect Community". community.mellanox.com. Retrieved 2016-06-22.
  34. Sur, Sayantan; Koop, Matthew J.; Lei; Panda, Dhabaleswar K. (2007). "Performance Analysis and Evaluation of Mellanox ConnectX InfiniBand Architecture with Multi-Core Platforms". hoti. 15th Annual IEEE Symposium on High-Performance Interconnects (HOTI 2007): 125–134. CiteSeerX 10.1.1.81.4890.
  35. "Mellanox Accelerates Half of the World's Petaflop Systems; Delivers Scalable Networking for Next Generation Supercomputers". Bloomberg. June 27, 2011.
  36. Harif, Tal Barak (August 30, 2011). "Mellanox Buffered by Orders as Economy Flags: Israel Overnight". Bloomberg. Retrieved 2011-10-29.
  37. "Mellanox Falls on Downgrade". Bloomberg. September 10, 2012. Retrieved 2011-10-29.
  38. "Is Mellanox Oracle's Networking B*tch?". SiliconAngle. June 20, 2011. Retrieved 2011-10-29.
  39. "Corporate and Financial Update" (PDF). Mellanox Technologies. June 2011. Retrieved 2011-10-29.
  40. Heruti-Sover, Tali (November 7, 2010). "High-tech company aims to be first Israeli firm to hire Palestinian engineers". Haaretz. Retrieved 2011-10-29.
  41. Levy, Aviv (21 June 2018). "Mellanox CEO: We employ over 100 Palestinians". Globes. Retrieved 25 July 2018.
  42. Mitnick, Joshua (April 22, 2011). "Tech diplomacy: Israeli CEO hires Palestinian programmers". The Christian Science Monitor. Retrieved 2011-10-29.
  43. "Mellanox Technologies Ranked Number 364 Fastest Growing Company in North America on Deloitte's 2012 Technology Fast 500™". Mellanox. Retrieved November 14, 2012.
  44. "Mellanox Wins Five HPCwire 2012 Readers' and Editors' Choice Awards". Mellanox. Retrieved Nov 13, 2012.
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