From NED to NASDAQ

Cavium team (Lto R): Amer Haider, Imran Badr and Raghib Hussain

On Wednesday, May 2, 2007, Cavium Networks (CAVM) was listed on the NASDAQ, the stock exchange of choice for tech companies in the US. A graduate of the NED University in Karachi is listed as the founder.
Given the diversity of the US and especially the tech sector, that might sound like an everyday occurrence. But a search of EDGAR, the electronic filing system of the United States Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC), shows that this is a first-of-its-kind event. It seems that M. Raghib Hussain, who graduated from NED with a Computer Systems Engineering degree in 1993/94 is the first founder of a public corporation in the US to list NED in his profile.
And this is not just any Initial Public Offering (IPO). Red Herring, a popular magazine in the business community, says "Cavium Networks ... is deemed by many as the `pick of the week',” describing the company as "a supplier of integrated semiconductor processors to “triple play” mavens such as Aruba Networks," that caters to clients whose networking equipment delivers “triple play” packages of voice, video, and data services at high speeds. Cavium is known," the magazine's IPO Watch column continues, "for its fast and secure system-on-chip processors.Its customer list is a ‘Who’s Who’ in tech with names such as Cisco, IBM, and Samsung."
And here is Red Herring's take on Cavium's prospects: "Formed in 2000, Cavium has reported an accumulated deficit of $61.9 million. But its days of gushing red ink may soon be over. Consider its first quarter: for the three months ending March 31, Cavium Networks reported revenues of $11.1 million--up 58.6 percent from $7 million for the same period a year ago. Cavium also cut its net loss sharply to $997,000 for that three-month period, down from $3 million a year ago. That’s the kind of numbers story that attracts attention on Wall Street."
Cavium Networks is a story about NEDians and Karchiites who attended Pakistani educational institutions and are making it to the top of their game - from the corridors of NED University to Wall Street.
As already stated, the company was launched by M. Raghib Hussain and a colleague in 2000. He was soon joined by fellow NEDians Amer Haider, who started and set up the marketing department and Imran Badr, who started the software department.
Raghib, currently the company's Chief Technology Officer (CTO) and VP for Software Engineering, attended Delhi College and then NED Engineering University, graduating in 1993-94, with a BE in Computer Systems. He started his career working at Zelin (Pvt.) Ltd., and then ITIM Associates in Karachi. Prior to Cavium Networks, Raghib has held senior technical roles in several startups and large organizations in Silicon Valley, including Cisco Systems. Raghib was a founding team member of VPNet (acquired by Avaya), where he was a key contributor in the design of the first commercial IPSecased VPN (VirtualPrivate Network) gateway. IPsec VPN Gateways became popular means of deploying security in enterprise and are widely used world wide today. At Cavium, Raghib was the key architect of Nitrox product family which is the leading security processor family in the industry today with most comprehensive security algorithms and low to highest performance scalable solution. Raghib was also a major contributor in Octeon multi-core processor family which provides highest performance per watt and per dollar for networking and communication industry. Along the way, Raghib has also earned an MS in Computer Engineering from San Jose State University.
Amer Haider, currently Director of Strategic Marketing and Ecosystem Development, attended D.J Science College and graduated from NED University in 1995 with a bachelor's in Mechanical Engineering. He also started his technical and management career in Karachi with Wavetech and other local concerns. He has been the backbone of Cavium's strategic and marketing efforts from the beginning, initially working alone and setting up the brand and products in the market and, in his current role, building partnerships with other technical players globally.
Imran Badr, currently Lead Software Architect, attended Malir Cantt College and graduated from NED University the same year as Amer, with a degree in Electrical Engineering. Imran Worked in Karachi for four years with local companies and Reuters before moving to the Silicon Valley. Working on the design and architecture of the software for Cavium products, Imran has played a key role in the success of Cavium's products.
Along the way, the three original NEDian team members have been joined by others; including Faisal Masood and Syed Saadullah Hussain in Software, and Sabahat Ashraf in Technical Documentation.

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