In its ongoing drive to provide customers with end-to-end IP convergence solutions, MiRO aligns itself with suppliers of high-quality products designed to increase throughput and performance. The decision in early May 2017 to distribute the TP-Link range of Wi-Fi routers and repeaters, underlines the company’s customer-centric business philosophy.

Marco de Ru, Chief Technical Officer for MiRO, explains that not only is the TP-Link brand well known, with a wide variety of exciting high-quality products, but the price to performance ratio is excellent. “We identified a couple of gaps in our existing product offering and established that TP-Link provided the perfect solution in terms of addressing the home and small office user market,” he notes.

“Interestingly, we have had a number of requests from our customer base over the past year for TP-Link routers and repeaters so this was a logical move for MiRO. The inclusion of the TP-Link products is not perceived as a threat to the current brands we distribute, but rather as complementary to our offering,” says De Ru.

De Ru is enthusiastic about the fact that MiRO is now able to offer its customers wireless solutions that fit nicely between its entry level and premier enterprise solutions in terms of cost. The range caters for both small home routers using wireless broadband as well as medium-level high bandwidth use, typical with small office environments. In addition to the routers available, the company will also be distributing TP-Link’s repeaters and powerline adapters to extend the router functionality over current power line structures. MiRO will initially distribute TP-Link’s connected products and later expand its offering with other products such as the switching range for SME users.

Recognised for their stability and reliability, TP-Link routers operate on high-speed 802.11ac dual band technology up to 733 Mbps. This makes them ideal for bandwidth-intensive applications such as gaming and video. An interesting feature, De Ru points out, is the USB port on the router, which enables users to share printers and files on the network. In addition to never needing to be restarted, the routers are aesthetically pleasing, allowing them to be readily incorporated into even the most discerning home and business environments.

De Ru believes that the benefits to both MiRO and TP-Link are reciprocal, with TP-Link now having access to a completely new customer channel. “MiRO encapsulates the widest IP market in South Africa and this allows TP-Link to leverage this footprint in order to increase its turnover. In addition, they are now able to offer their own customers complementary solutions through the MiRO distribution channel. The same applies for MiRO’s customers, who are provided with a number of alternative solutions.

“The biggest advantage for our customers, however, is that they do not need to go to a variety of suppliers for solutions, as they are now all available from one source – MiRO. We consider the customer’s specific and often unique requirements, and tailor customised converged solutions centred on performance and profitability,” he adds.