PR92250

PALO ALTO, Calif., Oct. 12, 2021 /PRNewswire=KYODO JBN/ --

-- With more than 1.2 billion devices managed in over 35 million homes and

small businesses, Plume cements its position as the cloud controller of the

world's largest software-defined network (SDN) --

Plume(R) (https://c212.net/c/link/?t=0&l=en&o=3319488-1&h=1221200379&u=https%3A%2F%2Fdiscover.plume.com%2F&a=Plume),

the personalized communications services pioneer, today announced that it

has closed $300 million in a new round of minority equity investment led by

SoftBank Vision Fund 2 (https://c212.net/c/link/?t=0&l=en&o=3319488-1&h=1687853149&u=https%3A%2F%2Fvisionfund.com%2F&a=SoftBank+Vision+Fund+2).

This round brings the company's valuation to $2.6 billion, with $697 million

raised to date. The investment will continue to drive research and development,

sales and marketing, new partnerships, and acquisitions as Plume continues its

global expansion and hyper-growth. In the last two quarters since its prior

round of equity investment by Insight Partners, Plume added more than 13

million new households, over 350 million new managed devices to its global

cloud platform, and acquired more than 60 new Communications Service Provider

(CSP) customers.

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More than 240 cable multiple system operators (MSOs), telecommunications

companies, and fixed wireless access operators of all sizes worldwide rely on

Plume as a primary vehicle to grow revenue, increase customer satisfaction and

retention, accelerate service velocity and innovation, reduce expenses, avoid

commoditization of broadband, and to expand their service area beyond their

broadband footprint.  Recently, Plume made the HomePass(TM) smart home service

available to all 25 million U.K. households, in partnership with Virgin Media,

including those households in areas not yet covered by the provider's broadband

network footprint.

"The pandemic has dramatically accelerated the adoption of digital services,

increasing our dependence on smart devices," said Nagraj Kashyap, Managing

Partner at SoftBank Investment Advisers, who joined the Plume Board of

Directors. "Through its innovative cloud data platform, we believe Plume's

consumer-first approach provides customers with reliable connectivity in their

homes and beyond. We are pleased to partner with Fahri and the team to support

their ambition of reinventing services for smart spaces globally."

The technology fueling smart spaces, such as homes and small businesses, has

experienced mass adoption over the past decade, especially over the last two

years. SoftBank estimates that there will be one trillion connected devices by

2025 (https://venturebeat.com/2018/10/16/softbank-believes-1-trillion-connected-devices-will-create-11-trillion-in-value-by-2025/), but CSPs have struggled with optimizing for and delivering exceptional

experiences for the modern consumer. Plume addresses this problem by offering a

suite of AI-driven, cloud-controlled services for residential consumers and

small businesses. Those services include adaptive, self-optimizing WiFi, secure

parental and access controls, advanced device security, motion awareness, and

back-end applications for CSPs, like predictive support tools and service &

network analytics. The data pipeline of these services and connected devices

provides unique insight into the smart home and small business.

"Plume is leading the industry with a cloud, massive data and open-source

driven Customer Experience  Management Platform that enables Communications

Service Providers to boost in-home WiFi experience for customers while also

minimizing their operational expenses substantially," said Anirudh Bhaskaran,

Senior Industry Analyst at Frost & Sullivan.

Customers benefit from Plume's constantly expanding platform through

OpenSync(TM), the most widely supported open-source, silicon-to-cloud framework

for smart spaces. With OpenSync, CSPs can decouple their service offerings from

hardware and rapidly curate and deliver new services over a multi-vendor,

open-platform architecture. Managed by a massively scalable cloud control

plane, new services can often be delivered without new equipment, reducing

capital spending and extending the useful life of existing infrastructure.

Since its creation in 2018, OpenSync has grown to power more than 39 million

access points and switches across a broad range of silicon software development

kit (SDK) and customer premises equipment (CPE) platforms, and has attracted

many third-party developers and contributors.

"Our explosive growth over the last few years is explained simply: Plume has

reinvented how services for smart spaces are curated, delivered at scale, and

managed and supported. We're moving beyond the limitations of the legacy

approaches that couple hardware and services into a 'box' -- choking the CSPs'

ability to introduce and scale delightful new experiences to the consumers

rapidly and effectively," said Fahri Diner, Founder and CEO of Plume. "Our

vision and ambitions are perfectly aligned with SoftBank's, and we are thankful

for their support and confidence in Plume."

Plume has more than 475 employees and continues to hire at a rapid pace for

positions both remote and in-person. To join Plume's expanding team, visit the

careers page here (https://c212.net/c/link/?t=0&l=en&o=3319488-1&h=894252902&u=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.plume.com%2Fhomepass%2Fcareers&a=here).

About Plume(R)

Plume(R) is the creator of the world's first SaaS experience platform for

Communications Service Providers (CSPs) and their subscribers, deployed in more

than 35+ million locations globally. As the only open and hardware-independent,

cloud-controlled solution, Plume enables the rapid delivery of new services for

smart homes, small businesses, and beyond at massive scale. On the front end,

Plume delivers self-optimizing adaptive WiFi, cyber-security, access and

parental controls, and more. CSPs get robust data- and AI-driven back-end

applications for unprecedented visibility, insights, support, operations, and

marketing. Plume leverages OpenSync(TM), an open-source framework that comes

pre-integrated and supported on the leading silicon, CPE, and platform SDKs.  

Plume's investors include Charter Communications, Comcast Cable, Foxconn,

Insight Partners, Jackson Square Ventures, Liberty Global Ventures, Presidio

Ventures, Qualcomm, Samsung, Service Electric Cablevision, Shaw Ventures,

Silicon Valley Bank, SoftBank and UpBeat Venture Partners.

Visit plume.com (https://c212.net/c/link/?t=0&l=en&o=3319488-1&h=170445850&u=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.plume.com%2F&a=plume.com), plume.com/homepass (https://c212.net/c/link/?t=0&l=en&o=3319488-1&h=3401808264&u=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.plume.com%2Fhomepass&a=plume.com%2Fhomepass), plume.com/workpass (https://c212.net/c/link/?t=0&l=en&o=3319488-1&h=3180729582&u=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.plume.com%2Fworkpass&a=plume.com%2Fworkpass

), and opensync.io (https://c212.net/c/link/?t=0&l=en&o=3319488-1&h=4261703438&u=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.opensync.io%2F&a=opensync.io).

Follow Plume on LinkedIn (https://c212.net/c/link/?t=0&l=en&o=3319488-1&h=3869009621&u=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.linkedin.com%2Fcompany%2Fplume-wifi&a=LinkedIn) and Twitter (https://c212.net/c/link/?t=0&l=en&o=3319488-1&h=2953211718&u=https%3A%2F%2Ftwitter.com%2Fplume&a=Twitter).

Plume and OpenSync are either trademarks or registered trademarks of Plume

Design, Inc. Other company and product names are used for informational

purposes only and may be trademarks of their respective owners.

SOURCE Plume Design, Inc.

CONTACT: Inkhouse for Plume, plume@inkhouse.com