MaiaEdge, the private networking infrastructure startup founded by ex-Juniper Networks staff, bolstered its customer premises equipment portfolio with a system designed to help operators extend private Ethernet beyond their owned fiber footprints.

The Path Border Controller (PBC) 100 Series aids fiber operators and service providers in extending private data link layer (layer-two/L2) services to off-net customers over available transport. The hardware is designed to eliminate the need for new fiber through automated path-provisioning to customer premises.

Designed to complement its carrier-grade PBC 2000, the 100 Series is far more compact and allows for fiber, dedicated internet access, or other IP transport means to establish L2 connections to customer sites. The startup claims its latest PBC box then can provide operators with a means to reach more customers and deliver more services faster without waiting on new physical infrastructure.

“For decades, where your fiber ended, your service opportunity ended with it. The PBC 100 Series breaks that link," MaiaEdge CEO Abilash Menon explained. "Providers can reach off-net customers without building fiber or negotiating a new NNI (network-to-network interface), then turn that connection into private connectivity, cloud access, AI infrastructure, and more. We're giving operators a way to expand their addressable market without expanding their physical network.”

MaiaEdge was founded in 2024 by Menon and Tim Ziemer, both former Juniper Networks staff. Menon served as director of software engineering at the now Hewlett Packard Enterprise (HPE)-owned firm, while Ziemer was Juniper’s VP of sales.

The startup raised some $20 million in a Series A round back in February and is vying to bring its hardware to the so-called “big middle” layer between data centers and enterprise through automated provisioning.

Among the early adopters of the PBC 100 Series is Dominican service provider HDCO Group.

“With the PBC 100 Series, we’re delivering [L2] services to customer sites that simply weren’t practical to reach before,” said Victor Rodriguez, CTO at HDCO. “It gives us a simple Ethernet experience over infrastructure that may come from multiple sources. Compared with the networking approaches we’ve used before, it is five-times easier to operate, and it opens opportunities we previously could not pursue.”