Cisco announced last Monday its intention to acquire Ubiquisys for a value of US$310 million in cash and other incentives. Ubiquisys is a small cell vendor integral to the future operations of the hardware manufacturer.

The acquisition diversifies the Cisco portfolio through the increase of software revenues providing new business opportunities for company whose main business is computer networks. 

Cisco is capitalizing on the increased interest in small cell technology and self-optimizing network architecture or SON. These new technologies allow wireless carriers to increase efficiency and capacity of its existing airwave services. Thus with the expansion, Cisco is growing into hardware and software technologies to create an integrated system for mobile carriers.

Ubiquisys is the market leader in small cell technology, which is essentially tiny cellular base stations that offload mobile data packets into a wired backhaul service. SON is the technology that allows mobile carriers to automatically plan, configure, manage and repair cellular networks.