Nova Labs, the creators of the Helium Network and pioneers of decentralized wireless infrastructure, announced today the acquisition of FreedomFi, a company that develops software for crowdsourced 5G networks.
With extensive experience in the development of open source tools for the deployment and management of next-generation distributed mobile networks, the FreedomFi team will collaborate with Nova Labs to make Helium the universal standard for decentralized networks. All 30 FreedomFi team members will join Nova Labs as part of the acquisition, with FreedomFi co-founders Boris Renski and Joey Padden guiding Nova Labs’ future expansion into the mobile space. In March of this year, Qualcomm and Samsung invested $9.5M in FreedomFi.
CEO and co-founder of Nova Labs, Amir Haleem, stated that the acquisition supports the company’s mission. “The FreedomFi team has unique capabilities, a proven record of innovation, and are developers of best-in-class technology, so from a strategic standpoint this acquisition supports our mission,” he explained. “The Helium mobile network will benefit greatly from the added expertise of FreedomFi and we look forward to working with Boris, Joey, and their team to make an even better consumer experience.”
FreedomFi has extensive experience with the Helium ecosystem. FreedomFi was the first to introduce and receive community approval for Helium 5G in 2021, paving the way for the HNT incentive model to support the second major wireless network on Helium. Since then, the FreedomFi team has released the world’s first Helium-compatible cellular base station, enabling consumers with no prior knowledge of 5G technologies to set up a cellular network at home and begin mining cryptocurrency with its operation. Additionally, the company has a “powered by FreedomFi” program that allows a variety of hardware and small cell vendors to create similar products for the Helium ecosystem.
FreedomFi co-founder and CEO Boris Renski stated, We’ve been working closely with the Helium ecosystem of hardware manufacturers, enabling them to build products to power consumer-deployable 5G networks for over a year. Joining forces with Nova Labs opens the door for innovation that will have lasting impacts on the telecom industry, while staying true to our mission to make mobile networks accessible to all.”
“Using a crypto incentive model to crowd-source deployments of cellular networks has the promise of finally making community-driven mobile networks a reality, bringing affordable and ubiquitous connectivity to more people,” said Joey Padden, CTO and co-founder of FreedomFi.
Source: FreedomFi
