(Editor’s Note: This article refers to a video interview shot in San Jose as part of TMCnet’s “On the Road” video series. To view the entire library of videos from Road Shows and other industry shows, as well as product demos and interviews in our in-house studio, visit the TMCnet Videos home page.)

While in San Jose recently, TMC’s CEO Rich Tehrani (News - Alert) had the chance to talk with Zak Wood, the Director of Global Marketing for TRENDnet. As Wood explained, the company was founded just outside of Los Angeles about 20 years ago, making it practically an elder statesman in high tech.

The company, which sells networking products to small and medium size business and home users, has a portfolio of over 300 networking and hardware products, Wood said, consumer and enterprise products, selling in over 130 countries. He said over the past five years they’ve seen “tremendous growth” in North America, and today “you can find us on all the online sites, Amazon.com (News - Alert), Buy.com, and at a fair number of retail locations as well.”

Wood said yes, they’ve seen a lot of competition over the years. In their industry, “there are actually 20 brands out there,” some more well-known than others. He candidly admitted that “we used to be in the bottom 20, but we’ve seen a real growth in brand awareness.” Wood noted that other companies which started bigger, 3Com (News - Alert) and others, have since “fallen by the wayside. It’s a tough industry. The landscape changes.”

As far as what’s going well now, Wood said “we’re doing well on wireless. We’re launching a lot of new products, and we’re first to market with a lot of products. We used to be a fast follower company, two or three months later with things, but we’ve really changed our strategy. We said hey, we can be first to market, and people are starting to take notice.”

Check out the full video interview below: