Makai offers the Hardened Operational Networking Unit (HONU), a rugged edge‑compute appliance that aggregates 5G, SATCOM and tactical data links into a single SD‑WAN gateway. Its autosensing firewall and load‑balancing engine dynamically select the lowest‑latency path, while a vendor‑agnostic, plug‑and‑play design enables rapid deployment of secure, high‑performance networks for defense and commercial mobile operations.
Funding
Funding not disclosed
Founders
Product
Problem
Field-deployed operations often require the rapid assembly of multi-domain communication networks, but existing solutions are bulky, vendor‑locked, and struggle to manage multiple WAN links with low latency. This hampers mission agility and increases the time needed to establish reliable connectivity for 5G, satellite, and tactical data links.
Solution
Makai’s Hardened Operational Networking Unit (HONU) is an edge‑compute platform designed for quick deployment and reconfiguration of multi‑domain mobile networks. The unit aggregates diverse WAN connections—5G, SATCOM, and tactical data links—into a single, resilient gateway, while an autosensing firewall dynamically selects the optimal path to minimize latency and maximize throughput. Its plug‑and‑play, vendor‑agnostic chassis allows mission‑critical hardware and software to be integrated without custom engineering. By providing a hardened, field‑ready appliance with built‑in SD‑WAN capabilities, HONU enables defense and commercial users to establish secure, high‑performance networks on demand.
Target Audience
Primary customers are defense agencies and DoD components (e.g., Army, Navy, Air Force, Marine Corps) as well as commercial entities that require mobile, high‑capacity networking for emergency response, remote site operations, or temporary event coverage.
Features
- Ruggedized edge compute chassis certified for harsh environments and rapid field deployment
- Concurrent support for multiple WAN interfaces (5G NR, SATCOM, tactical data links) with automatic load balancing
- Autosensing firewall that monitors link quality in real time and switches paths to optimize latency and bandwidth
- Vendor‑agnostic modular architecture allowing seamless integration of third‑party radios, radios, and mission software
- SD‑WAN controller with API access for centralized orchestration and policy enforcement
- Integrated security suite supporting DoD RMF compliance and end‑to‑end encryption
- Remote diagnostics and firmware updates via secure management console
- Plug‑and‑play connectors and pre‑configured network templates to reduce setup time