SynOptics Communications was a

Santa Clara, California Santa Clara (; Spanish for " Saint Clare") is a city in Santa Clara County, California. The city's population was 127,647 at the 2020 census, making it the eighth-most populous city in the Bay Area. Located in the southern Bay Area, the cit ...

-based early

computer network A computer network is a set of computers sharing resources located on or provided by network nodes. The computers use common communication protocols over digital interconnections to communicate with each other. These interconnections are ...

equipment vendor from 1985 until 1994. SynOptics popularized the concept of the modular

Ethernet hub An Ethernet hub, active hub, network hub, repeater hub, multiport repeater, or simply hub is a network hardware device for connecting multiple Ethernet devices together and making them act as a single network segment. It has multiple input/out ...

and high-speed Ethernet networking over copper twisted-pair and fiber optic cables.

History

SynOptics Communications was founded in 1985 by Andrew K. Ludwick and Ronald V. Schmidt, both of whom worked at Xerox's

Palo Alto Research Center PARC (Palo Alto Research Center; formerly Xerox PARC) is a research and development company in Palo Alto, California. Founded in 1969 by Jacob E. "Jack" Goldman, chief scientist of Xerox Corporation, the company was originally a division of Xero ...

(PARC). The most significant product that Synoptics produced was LattisNet (originally named AstraNet) in 1987. This meant that unshielded twisted-pair cabling already installed in office buildings could be re-utilized for computer networking instead of special

coaxial cable Coaxial cable, or coax (pronounced ) is a type of electrical cable consisting of an inner conductor surrounded by a concentric conducting shield, with the two separated by a dielectric ( insulating material); many coaxial cables also have a p ...

s. The star network topology made the network much easier to manage and maintain. Together these two innovations directly led to the ubiquity of Ethernet networks. Before the final standard version of what is known today as the

10BASE-T 1 (one, unit, unity) is a number representing a single or the only entity. 1 is also a numerical digit and represents a single unit of counting or measurement. For example, a line segment of ''unit length'' is a line segment of length 1 ...

protocol, there were several different methods and standards for running Ethernet over

twisted-pair Twisted pair cabling is a type of wiring used for communications in which two conductors of a single circuit are twisted together for the purposes of improving electromagnetic compatibility. Compared to a single conductor or an untwisted ba ...

cabling at various speeds, such as

StarLAN StarLAN was the first IEEE 802.3 standard for Ethernet over twisted pair wiring. It was standardized by the standards association of the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE) as 802.3e in 1986, as the 1BASE5 version of Ethernet. ...

. LattisNet was similar to the final 10BASE-T protocol except that it had slightly different voltage and signal characteristics. Synoptics updated their product line to the 10BASE-T specification once it was published. Through the late 1980s and into the early 1990s, SynOptics produced a series of innovative products including early

10BASE-2 10BASE2 (also known as cheapernet, thin Ethernet, thinnet, and thinwire) is a variant of Ethernet that uses thin coaxial cable terminated with BNC connectors to build a local area network. During the mid to late 1980s this was the dominan ...

hubs, pre-standard (LattisNet), and

100BASE-TX In computer networking, Fast Ethernet physical layers carry traffic at the nominal rate of 100 Mbit/s. The prior Ethernet speed was 10 Mbit/s. Of the Fast Ethernet physical layers, 100BASE-TX is by far the most common. Fast Ether ...

products. The company was the market leader in Ethernet LAN hubs over rivals

3Com 3Com Corporation was an American digital electronics manufacturer best known for its computer network products. The company was co-founded in 1979 by Robert Metcalfe, Howard Charney and others. Bill Krause joined as President in 1981. Metcalfe e ...

and

Cabletron Cabletron Systems was a manufacturer of networking computer equipment throughout the 1980s and 1990s primarily based in Rochester, New Hampshire, in the United States. They also had manufacturing facilities in Ironton, Ohio, and in Ireland. Hist ...

. Despite intense competition that drove down prices, Synoptics' annual revenue grew to a high of $700 million in 1993. To move away from the rapidly commoditizing Layer 1/2 Ethernet equipment market and grow their market share in the increasingly lucrative and more profitable Layer 3 networking arena, SynOptics merged with

Billerica, Massachusetts Billerica (, ) is a town in Middlesex County, Massachusetts, United States. The population was 42,119 according to the 2020 census. It takes its name from the town of Billericay in Essex, England. History In the early 1630s, a Praying India ...

based

Wellfleet Communications Wellfleet Communications was an Internet router company founded in 1986 by Paul Severino, Bill Seifert, Steven Willis and David Rowe based in Bedford, Massachusetts, and later Billerica, Massachusetts. In an attempt to more effectively compete ...

on July 6, 1994 in a US$ 2.7 Billion dollar deal to form

Bay Networks Bay Networks was a network hardware vendor formed through the merger of Santa Clara, California based SynOptics Communications and Billerica, Massachusetts based Wellfleet Communications on July 6, 1994. SynOptics was an important early innov ...

. SynOptics headquarters at the time of the merger with Wellfleet was in the pair of strikingly-designed sloped buildings at the Northeast corner of the intersection of

California's Great America California's Great America, often shortened to Great America, is a amusement park located in Santa Clara, California. Owned and operated by Cedar Fair, it originally opened in 1976 as one of two parks built by the Marriott Corporation. Califor ...

Parkway and Mission College Blvd in Santa Clara, an area known for featuring numerous networking start-ups such as Ungermann-Bass. These buildings are currently occupied by Palo Alto Networks.

was acquired by Canadian company

Nortel Nortel Networks Corporation (Nortel), formerly Northern Telecom Limited, was a Canadian multinational telecommunications and data networking equipment manufacturer headquartered in Ottawa, Ontario, Canada. It was founded in Montreal, Quebec, ...

in June 1998 for $9.1 billion, forming

Nortel Networks Nortel Networks Corporation (Nortel), formerly Northern Telecom Limited, was a Canadian multinational telecommunications and data networking equipment manufacturer headquartered in Ottawa, Ontario, Canada. It was founded in Montreal, Queb ...

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Synoptics Defunct networking companies Nortel Companies established in 1985 Defunct companies based in the San Francisco Bay Area Technology companies based in the San Francisco Bay Area Manufacturing companies based in the San Francisco Bay Area Companies based in Santa Clara, California 1985 establishments in California

History

See also

References