SUNNYVALE, CA--(Marketwired - Nov 3, 2014) - Meru Networks® (NASDAQ: MERU), a leader in intelligent Wi-Fi networking, today announced that it has been named the winner of the October SearchNetworking Network Innovation Award for its achievements in the wireless software-defined-networking (SDN) space. As the only wireless local area network (WLAN) vendor to have received OpenFlow™ conformance for its Wi-Fi equipment from the Open Networking Foundation, Meru is at the forefront of wireless SDN innovation.

"SDN is providing large-scale benefits in unified wired and wireless environments. It is our goal to harness these capabilities to ensure our customers gain enhanced performance, agility and flexibility -- all while experiencing a unified view of their networks and QoS across these networks," said Ajay Malik, senior vice president of worldwide engineering and products at Meru. "Receiving this award is a testament to what we have been able to accomplish thus far to address the rise of the cloud, BYOD and the Internet of Things, as well as the SDN-focused roadmap we have laid out."

While SDN is gaining a significant amount of traction in data centers, its impact on unified wired and wireless environments is a more recent development. Meru intelligent 802.11ac Wi-Fi solutions provide uninterrupted user experience for education, healthcare, hospitality and enterprise. SDN allows for these organizations to choose the best-of-breed wired and wireless vendors that are best suited to meet network requirements and business/occupational demands.

By taking an open-standards approach that leverages OpenFlow and SDN, Meru enables unified management of wired and wireless networks, in addition to integration of an increasing number of high-quality, third-party applications. The company is already witnessing a growing number of colleges and universities showing interest in adopting its innovative approach to SDN-enablement for the campus access layer.

In the past three months alone, Meru has taken major strides to integrate SDN into its offerings and remain ahead of the market. After becoming the first vendor to complete qualification with Microsoft Lync® for 802.11ac wireless networking solutions, the company announced Meru Collaborator which is designed to ensure predictable experience for Microsoft Lync users. Meru Collaborator is built on top of an OpenDaylight SDN controller for any OpenFlow-enabled wired or wireless network.

In addition, Meru recently unveiled Meru Center, a new software platform that gives organizations a central networked application provisioning engine and management dashboard. In conjunction with Meru Center, the company also released Meru App Store, which simplifies the discovery and deployment of network applications. The Meru App Store features SDN-enabled applications including Meru Collaborator and Personal Bonjour®.

For more information on Meru's wireless SDN solutions, please visit: http://www.merunetworks.com/products/technology/sdn/

About Meru Networks
 Meru Networks (NASDAQ: MERU) is a leader in intelligent 802.11ac Wi-Fi solutions delivering uninterrupted user experience for education, healthcare, hospitality and enterprise. The Meru open-standards-based architecture is designed to enable unified management of wired and wireless networks. Its end-to-end application QoS enables enforceable service-level agreements. Meru provides top performance and high capacity in high-density environments. Visit www.merunetworks.com or call (408) 215-5300 for more information.

©2014 Meru Networks. Meru and Meru Networks are registered trademarks and the Meru logo is a trademark of Meru Networks, Inc. in the United States. Apple and Bonjour are trademarks of Apple Inc. registered in the U.S. and other countries. Microsoft and Lync are either registered trademarks or trademarks of Microsoft Corporation in the United States and/or other countries.  OpenFlow™ is a trademark of the Open Networking Foundation.