Peripheral Vision
Ryan O’Donovan’s Xunison offers telcos a range of hardware and apps that give customers the latest home-control tech while tying them more closely to their ISP. Having established a firm footing in Saudi Arabia, the company is now making moves on the lucrative US market, writes Gerry Byrne
“Iwait until I get inside a company, then I open up like a butterfly,” explained Ryan O’Donovan as he outlined plans to expand his telco service company, Xunison, outside of its established base in Saudi Arabia.
Lepidopteran analogies are unusual in Irish business circles but then Xunison is an unusual company and its founders, O’Donovan (35) and Chinese national Guojun Qin (35), are not exactly your average Irish entrepreneurs. Through Xunison they command a share of the Middle East ISP Internet of Things (IOT) market and are poised to grab a slice of the US market as well.
A few years ago, Ryan O’Donovan was selling set-top video boxes to retailers. Not so long beforehand he managed door-to-door selling of broadband hook-ups for UTV Internet. He has also been involved with enterprises established to provide electric car chargers, among others. In January 2023, he relocated to the United States on the first step to what he forecasts will be the installation of routers and related WiFi IOT peripherals in upwards of one million American homes.
It’s hard to describe in simple terms what Ryan O’Donovan and his company do. One reason is because there are so few like them (he reckons there’s only one other significant US competitor). And, to use techie jargon, the space he is in is actually quite mature. But what he does there is very different.
For example, in most homes IOT peripheral devices are usually purchased independently of the main telco or internet service supplier (ISP) such as Eir or Sky, or their overseas equivalents. Users have to install peripherals themselves on the back on the existing WiFi router supplied by the telco or ISP providers.
An example is the popular cell phone app-based central heating control system offered by Hive. Related appcontrolled systems include security and lighting controls, but these are supplied and serviced by Hive, and it is Hive, not Eir, that benefits from the revenues they generate.
Put simply, O’Donovan has come up with a way to enable telcos get a better share of the peripherals action, and the proof of his pudding can be found in Saudi Arabia where the systems he and Qin devised are now common fare for local telcos. It goes without saying that Xunison also benefits.
Xunison offers telcos and ISPs a range of plug-and-play hardware
which can be badged in the telco’s branding. At the apex is the ubiquitous router which, he says, comes already linked to devices handling security, lighting, heating, media streaming services, monitors and alarms for babies and the elderly, as well as mesh products to extend the range and strength of the WiFi signal.
All of these devices are plugand-play and can be operated by simply adding them to the list of devices in the home. There is no need for separate apps or programming for each device.
At the heart of the system is software developed to link all these devices together into a single, allembracing app. Only one other company, US firm Plume, has so far done anything similar, O’Donovan says. Plume is valued at $3.3bn and it has received almost $750m in funding. In 2021 Plume reported it had installed more than 1 billion unique client devices worldwide.
The most important thing is that additional services can be sold through the platform, creating more upselling opportunities for the telco, ‘stickiness’ for the customer and, as a consequence, reduction of customer churn.
“Imagine I am a customer and I have multiple home devices and cameras, and parental control, and the mesh signal extender,” O’Donovan explains. “It’s going to be very hard for me to move from Virgin Media to Sky, for example, for a saving of just a few euro per month. I have created that ecosystem, I have somebody supporting it, and everything works, so I am happy customer.
“Most telcos are using an old standard software protocol that is 10 to 15 years old. Our platform is next generation and works on 5G. In the Middle East we have seen a huge reduction in customer complaints, service calls and very little churn with the telcos that we are working with.”
Xunison’s biggest customer is Saudi Telecom. “As a result, we are now working with many other telcos in the region, who are selling our devices to their customers under their own brand. We brand our devices with the telecom’s branding and include the application and the devices in the home.”
Xunison picked up its first Middle East telecoms client after one of its executives called to the Xunison stand at a trade show. But how does someone who initially trained in building services technology evolve into an expert in IOT development and marketing?
“While I was selling for ISPs, I saw an obvious gap in the market as consumers complained there were blackspots which the WiFi couldn’t reach. At the same time, we were also being asked for other services like parental control and security cameras. I saw this gap in the market where the ISPs could increase their