Peraso Technologies has appointed Bill McLean as CEO to advance its goal of selling wireless networking chips based on the Wireless Gigabit (WiGig) standard. These chips could bring new flexibility to emerging applications such as virtual reality, and McLean aims to help develop those business opportunities.
Right now, VR headsets aren’t selling as well as expected, even though VR has huge potential as a new entertainment and gaming medium. One of the things holding VR back is that the most powerful headsets have to be connected via wires to gaming PCs. With WiGig chipsets, the VR headsets could communicateover high-speed wireless links to the PCs, which could eliminate the wires. Toronto-based Peraso wants to provide chips for that market and more.
McLean will replace founder Ron Glibbery, who will remain at the company and serve as senior vice president of corporate development. Peraso is shifting from initial customer shipments to higher-volume production as the WiGig market matures.
“I have extensive experience as a mid-stage CEO with companies that are preparing for a major growth phase, which is what attracted me to Peraso,” said McLean, in an email. “As the only pure-play WiGig chipset vendor that offers some differentiated technology — such as how our dual radio system solves the VR radio problem — we have an opportunity to capitalize on the wireless VR and fixed broadband wireless markets.”
McLean has over 30 years of experience in the wireless, semiconductor, and networking markets. He served as the CEO of Ozmo Devices, a semiconductor company focused on ultra-low power and highly integrated Wi-Fi Direct solutions. After Ozmo Devices was acquired by Atmel, McLean served as vice president and general manager of Atmel’s Wi-Fi solutions business.
Earlier in his career, McLean cofounded GloNav and served as CEO of the company, which developed GPS receivers for the mobile industry and was later acquired by NXP. He was also chairman of Firecomms, which developed optical solutions for the plastic optical fiber market, and he held executive positions at Anadigm and Parthus.
“As the only pure-play WiGig company, our chipsets are already powering everything from commercial fixed broadband wireless services to innovative new wireless VR headsets with new markets, applications, and opportunities emerging for 60 GHz technology,” said Glibbery, in a statement. “With our proven technology and established customer relationships, it is the ideal time for Bill to define and execute the next phase of the company’s growth and development as we enter into WiGig’s high-volume market cycle.”
Peraso was founded in 2009 and currently has 90 employees. Its chips operate in the 60-gigahertz wireless spectrum, which enables high bandwidth at short ranges. WiGig speeds could be as much as 10 times faster than traditional Wi-Fi networks, Peraso said.
This post by Dean Takahashi originally appeared on VentureBeat.
Tagged with: Peraso
via Mint VR