Powerwave's biggest early market was South Korea. In the mid-1990s Korea was building one of the first digital cell networks in the world, and every base station needed amplifiers to boost its radio signal. Powerwave, an Irvine, California company that had started life as Milcom International, made those amplifiers. When it went public in December 1996, cell phones were turning from a luxury into something everyone carried. Powerwave bet that every new tower would need its gear.

From Milcom to Powerwave

Alfonso Cordero founded the company, which was incorporated in Delaware in January 1985 as Milcom International. It took the Powerwave name in June 1996, just before the IPO. Its products were radio frequency power amplifiers for wireless networks. An amplifier has to boost a signal without distorting it, and that gets harder as more calls share the same tower. Powerwave sold to the equipment makers who built networks for the carriers.

Eleven-Fifty and a Long Ride

Powerwave sold shares at $11.50 in December 1996, on Nasdaq under the ticker PWAV. It grew with each new generation of cell networks and bought rivals to get bigger. Prices for wireless gear kept falling, and a few giant equipment makers held most of the buying power. Losses mounted. Powerwave filed for bankruptcy in January 2013, and Nasdaq removed its shares that March.

Cover: Breaking Storm, Coast of Maine, Winslow Homer. Art Institute of Chicago, public domain. Chosen for a storm breaking on the coast (Powerwave).