Belair for Minneapolis

Minneapolis has signed on to become the anchor-tenant of a municipal Wi-Fi network that will be owned and operated by service provider US Internet. The project will span the entire 60-square-mile city and will offer businesses and residents high-speed Internet access from 1 to 3 Mbps for a current cost of $19.99 per month. US Internet also will offer a $24 or $29 product that will provide 5 or 6 Mbps for those niche customers that require greater bandwidth. US Internet won the bid with a mobile broadband mesh networking solution from BelAir Networks and will leverage the Quality of Service (QoS) capabilities of the BelAir platform to support emergency services efforts as well as eventual moves to Voice over IP (VoIP) and mobile Wi-MAX. As a Minnesota-based company, Lange says US Internet already had a reputation in the local community and was well positioned to win the contract, but he notes that the BelAir technology was "a big part of the reason we won."

EarthLink Unwires Milpitas

The city of Milpitas, California will soon have a citywide wireless network. By next month, over 300 WiFi radios will have been installed throughout the city, courtesy of EarthLink. According to the company, the network will provide wireless access for both residents as well as serve as a communications platform for the city's emergency responders.

Washington State Ferries Award Wi-Fi Contract

Parsons has been awarded the contract, according to a mailing from the WSF today, and it's confirmed on Mobilisa's ferry site. The service has been operated at no cost to date, but Parsons will convert it to a fee-based service. The WSF handles about half of all passenger trips on ferries in the US—a total of about 25 million passenger trips each year—and a considerable but smaller fraction of all car ferry trips.

Sprint's WiMAX Uses

Sprint Nextel examines WiMax technology as a way to provide less costly broadband data services. t was also clear from the executive's presentation that Sprint hasn't quite settled on how exactly it will use WiMax as a backhaul technology in the field yet. Initially, the carrier is looking at using 802.16d fixed WiMax -- possibly modified to reduce packet jitter and delay -- alongside its mobile network. It may, however, move to 802.16e if the price drops as manufacturing volumes ramp up. The company has also been examining using mesh for both access and backhaul on the same network.

Free Open Source Mesh Wireless Software.

CUWiNware 0.7.0 enables neighbors and communities to create a mesh wireless network that can share Internet connections, establish local VoIP services, and utilize peer-to-peer connections to improve their broadband experience.

Rail-Fi on Track

Several hundred trains will be equipped with Wi-Fi for access and WiMax, satellite, and cell transceivers for backhaul by the end of 2007. Electrical outlets are being added to existing trains and have become a requirement on new passenger cars. With outlets, the train becomes a far superior place to work than any alternative for commuters. Today also brings an expected announcement, which is that Virgin will work with Nomad Digital, the folks behind the Brighton-to-London line, to equip all of its English West Coast trains with Internet service. Nomad uses fixed WiMax at regular intervals to provide service, and notes in this article that they will have the third-generation cellular data standard HSDPA as a backup to cover gaps in service. Top speed will be about 2 Mbps on this line.

Houston's WiFi Parking

Houston has ordered 750 solar powered electronic parking meters for a 1.9 mile area of downtown capable of accepting credit cards, coins and paper currency as well as providing maps of the surrounding areas. WFI will design and deploy the dedicated 802.11g WiFi network, the first of its kind, to support the parking meters. It's the first system in the country that relies on a Wi-Fi network instead of a cellular network.

Helping Amazon's wireless Net

Craig Barrett, Intel's chairman, will be traveling to a remote island in the Amazon to launch a WiMax network in Parintins. The island is only accessible by either boat or plane. 114,000 people live there. Working with a number of Brazilian companies, Intel led the effort to install a wireless network there and says that similar projects will be initiated in other locations througout the world.

Moto's Symbolic Convergence

The world's second largest cellphone maker is already working on dualmode handsets to allow end-users to switch between WiFi and cellular networks. Anthony Bartolo, vice president and general manager of Symbol's wireless infrastructure and RFID divisions, says the firm's upcoming WiNG architecture, which will control and manage WLAN, RFID, and cellular deployments in the enterprise, could be the basis for fixed/mobile convergence services.

Cingular Lights Up 3G Around Northern Cal

Cingular says in the next few weeks it will publicly announce that its 3G (HSDPA) network is available in cities in Northern California like Stockton, Fresno, Modesto, Sacramento and Vallejo. The company says the service has been available in San Francisco and San Jose since December 2005. The networks in Stockton and Fresno were already turned on earlier this month. The speeds are supposed to get between 400 kbps to 700 kbps.

Sources: FCC backs airline Wi-Fi at Logan

Boston airport authorities cannot stop Continental Airlines from offering wireless Internet service in its frequent flier lounge under a proposed Federal Communications Commission ruling. Massport instructed airlines in 2005 to unplug their wireless and wireline high-speed Internet access in frequent flier lounges at Boston-Logan International Airport and use the fee-based system the airport was launching. Massport contends the rival services would interfere with its network offered at Logan, raise safety concerns and violate lease agreements.

IEEE Replaces 802.20 Standards Group Leader

The IEEE has replaced the top four officers of the group working on developing the 802.20 standard for wireless broadband, following complaints (largely from Intel) that Qualcomm was exerting undue influence on the process.

Despite its Critics, Muni-Wireless Broadband Systems Growing

Worldwide deployments of municipal wireless networks for public Internet access will continue at a rapid pace over the next few years, with the US leading the way. The total worldwide market will reach 248 deployments by the end of 2006, and will grow to over 1,500 by the end of 2010, according to In-Stat.

Wireless Foot in Mouth Disease

Cohda Wireless is picking a public fight with the WISP industry for concealing Wi-Fi's flaws from municipalities. Cohda claims "the industry is keeping [this] fact very quiet: the increased RMS delay spread arising from multipath interference severely limits the range and throughput of Vanilla 802.11 nodes in urban deployments."

Rural providers keeping pace with DSL - Independent Technology

Rural telcos are increasingly deploying Wi-Fi and WiMAX technologies. Sixty-four percent of members are offering wireless data services. Fourteen percent also provide Internet service provider services outside their traditional markets.

FCC Spectrum Auction Lands $14 Billion

The advanced wireless services spectrum auction, also known as Auction 66, closed up shop this afternoon, with bidders putting up a total of nearly $14 billion. The 28-day-long auction ended after 161 rounds, with 104 of the 168 registered bidders winning at least one license. All but 35 of the total 1,122 licenses up for grabs received bids.

WiFi and Cellular Convergence Test Data Available for Carriers and Developers

When do traditional cellular networks mesh with WiFi networks, since they are both datapipes for voice and data? Internet Telephony magazine explores the issue.

Get Yer Wireless Here

Carnivals step right up to go wireless with fairground-wide mesh networks. Customized for NAM by Encino, Calif.-based systems integrator Affidia Systems, the network comprises infrastructure from Firetide Inc. , WiFi access points from ValuePoint, and handheld devices by Symbol Technologies.

Fon Unveils $5 Router

Fon aimed to build a global network of one million wireless hotspots by the end of four years. The idea was to convince users to install Fon firmware on their Linksys residential routers, turning them into a unified community of global hotspots. As of June, 54,000 users had signed up to be 'Foneros'. The new device, named "La Fonera", is made by Taiwanese networking vendor Accton Technology.

Fresno considering citywide wireless network

The downtown area of Fresno, California has seen increased usage by both residents and visitors and has prompted the city to issue an RFP for the development and deployment of a citywide network within the next six months. According to city officials, the downtown network has cost the city less than $300 a month to manage, and it has seen over 200 people access it during peak weekday hours. They are projecting that a citywide network will not cost that much to maintain and will attract enough users to justify the investment.

Wireless Network for the Sacramento Region

Nine counties in North Central California may be following the same path as the Silicon Valley region with the announcement of a group seeking to develop a wireless network to cover the area. The Wireless Sacramento Regional Coalition (WiSac) project is seeking to develop and deploy a network that will cover nine counties over a 12,000-square-mile area, including Sacramento County, and over 30 municipalities with a combined population of about 3 million, including Sacramento. According to the organization, the network will provide VoIP, data, video streaming applications as well as a communications platform for local and county government and services. As of now, the plan calls for access to be either free or at a minimal cost.

Meru Gets Class

Meru has won contracts with 70 educational institutions -- both K-12 schools and school systems, as well as colleges and universities -- over the last year. Almost all of the schools they're contracted with are replacing existing Wi-Fi infrastructure equipment, mostly existing hardware from industry giant Cisco, according to CEO Abu-Hakima. "We come in with a single channel architecture, the ability to support 11b and g clients without compromise to b or g, and seamless roaming."

Symbol for Sale

The logistics plus Wi-Fi and barcode giant will auction itself off: The firm could sell for $3.2b, a 20% premium over its current market capitalization. Symbol was a very early Wi-Fi player, using the technology to disentangle cables from its barcode readers and other devices used to track items in warehouses, on trucks, and on shelves. It was also an early entrant into the WLAN switch market with very weird devices that eventually matured and took a sizeable percentage of that market segment. However, the Wall Street Journal reports that the company has had problems in capitalizing on the markets it’s part of or dominates, despite good but not well-growing revenue and marginal net profits. The company also went through an accounting scandal that led to eight executives pleading guilty and the CEO fleeing the country.

Municipalities try to build their business plans around wireless access

Cities are trying to make financial sense of Wi-Fi projects, according to this Government Computer News analysis. Nagging doubts have so far been unable to stop a slew of towns and cities from pioneering ubiquitous wireless Internet access.

Ellen Kirk Out at Tropos?

Former Qualcomm Inc. executive Ellen Kirk may be out at top municipal WiFi mesh startup Tropos Networks Inc., according to vendor sources. She is, however, no longer listed as part of the firm's management team on the company's Website.