Wifi Revolution

Kineto Wireless Inc., a leading supplier of Unlicensed Mobile Access (UMA) technology, and Extricom, a developer and manufacturer of next generation WLAN solutions for the enterprise, have reportedly achieved an industry first: seamless handover and continuity of active UMA voice calls and data sessions between WiFi (News - Alert) access points in a WLAN environment.

The two companies reported today that their solutions have passed rigorous interoperability testing – meaning that mobile operators can now combine these solutions to extend their UMA service offerings into the enterprise and commercial hot-zone markets.

By combining Extricom’s unique WiFi infrastructure with Kineto’s UMA technology, mobile users can move between WiFi and UMA access points transparently, without any interruption in service. This can be accomplished while at the same time maintaining WiFi network security - as well as the IPSec tunnel used to secure UMA services. The tests were reportedly conducted using commercially-available UMA-enabled handsets in order to illustrate the handset-agnostic benefits of the combined solution.

With this new solution, enterprises will be able to unlock the true value of mobile/WiFi convergence. Seamless handover of calls means superior in-office coverage, single-number convenience, improved productivity and, best of all, much lower costs for enterprise communications.

“As more and more employees use their mobile phone as their main phone, the overall cost and performance of mobile service becomes an increasing concern for enterprise IT departments,” said Ken Kolderup, vice president of marketing for Kineto, in a press release. “The traditional challenge of WiFi mobility has been overcome through our collaboration with Extricom, enabling mobile operators to now confidently extend their UMA services into the enterprise market and offer those enterprises the combination of superior mobile performance and lower costs.”

Making this possible is Extricom’s award-winning Interference-Free WLAN system – which is said to represent “a fundamental shift in architecture from ‘cell-planning’ to a ‘channel blanket’ topology.” Extricom’s patented technology reportedly “eliminates the co-channel interference that plagues traditional WLAN systems, to deliver seamless and zero-latency mobility, robust, ‘wire-like’ client connections, and the ability to design for a guaranteed and predictable level of service for all users.” The high performance solution delivers data, voice and video over WiFi – and manages to do so while eliminating “the iterative and costly RF cell-planning of traditional solutions”

“With this proven interoperability, Kineto and Extricom are reaching another major milestone in the evolution of mobile/Wi-Fi convergence, bringing the increasingly popular benefits of UMA technology – high performance, low-cost mobile services – to enterprise wireless LANs,” said David Confalonieri, vice president of marketing for Extricom. “This collaboration will help expand the UMA opportunities for mobile operators, as well as unlock new operational benefits for enterprises across all vertical industries.”

For more information, visit www.kineto.com and www.extricom.com.

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Patrick Barnard is Associate Editor for TMCnet and a columnist covering the telecom industry. To see more of his articles, please visit Patrick Barnard’s columnist page.

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