GigaBeam, Motorola and Cisco Technologies Selected by the Ministry of the Interior, Kingdom of Bahrain, for an Integrated Telecommunications Network
Monday April 9, 1:25 pm ET
GigaBeam Receives Contract For $1.37 Million
HERNDON, Va.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--GigaBeam Corporation (NASDAQ:GGBM - News) has received a $1.37 million contract for WiFiber® wireless fiber links and installation services from the Ministry of the Interior (the "Ministry") for the Kingdom of Bahrain ("Bahrain") intended as a backbone transport infrastructure for an ultra high-speed telecommunications network (similar to a Metropolitan Area Network or MAN) linking government buildings across Bahrain. GigaBeam's contract was issued in conjunction with contracts received by resellers of Motorola, Inc. (NYSE: MOT - News) and Cisco Systems, Inc. (NASDAQ: CSCO - News) to provide other telecommunications hardware for the same Ministry network.
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Lt. Col. Mansoor Al Hajeri, Director of Communications at the Ministry of Interior, who is managing the project, said, "The communications technologies from Motorola, Cisco and GigaBeam now allows us to create a network that gives us a wide range of capabilities to install voice, video and data communications. I am very pleased with the compatibility of the technologies and the cooperation we have received from the representatives of the three companies."
Lou Slaughter, Chairman and CEO of GigaBeam, stated:
"GigaBeam's WiFiber wireless fiber links are intended to create a scalable Gigabit-per-second "layer 1" backbone transport infrastructure connecting government buildings across Bahrain. We expect that the WiFiber links will be deployed in multiple interconnecting loops or circuits forming a GigaMesh(TM) network. A GigaMesh network consists of interconnecting loops providing increased network resiliency. We anticipate that WiFiber is primarily a transport application because of the significant bandwidth or capacity available with GigaBeam's WiFiber technology. Wireless communications to date have mostly been limited to access applications utilizing hub and spoke architectures for deployment.
"This contract from the Ministry followed over four months of testing of GigaBeam's WiFiber in Bahrain. Other technologies were evaluated but we believe that GigaBeam's WiFiber was chosen because of its performance and reliability. During the testing period, the WiFiber links were subjected to record rainfall across Bahrain and several significant sandstorms. WiFiber performed as we expected."
Lou Slaughter further remarked that, "This contract from the Ministry represents a substantial build out of a large GigaMesh infrastructure using GigaBeam's WiFiber. It is also important because we expect this project to be a model in the Middle East and North Africa ("MENA") region."
GigaBeam WiFiber products operate in the 71-76 GHz and 81-86 GHz upper millimeter wave spectrum bands. This portion of the spectrum has been authorized by the Federal Communications Commission and the European Conference of Postal and Telecommunications Administrations (CEPT) for licensed wireless commercial use. Use of these frequency bands for commercial use was pioneered by GigaBeam's founders.
GigaBeam's technology, utilizing these large blocks of contiguous spectrum, enables multi-Gigabit-per-second communications through use of Gigabit Ethernet and other standard protocols. The current speed achieved by GigaBeam's WiFiber G-1.25 product series is full duplex at one Gigabit-per-second (equivalent to 647 T1 lines or 1,000 DSL connections) which supports GigE protocol. GigaBeam previously announced its WiFiber G-2.7 series, to be released in the second half of 2007, and which is designed to operate at 2.7 Gbps. The protocols to be supported by the G-2.7 product series include 2 x GigE (2 x 1 Gbps); OC-48 / STM-16 (2.488 Gbps); SMPTE 292M (1.485 Gbps) and both 1 and 2 Gbps fiber channel. GigaBeam also plans deployment of future products capable of 10 Gigabits-per-second utilizing either the 10 Gigabit Ethernet or OC-192 protocol standards.
GigaBeam's WiFiber technology is similar to terrestrial fiber in terms of speed and reliability. WiFiber has a substantial advantage over terrestrial fiber because WiFiber can be rapidly deployed and costs less to deploy than terrestrial fiber. Terrestrial fiber can take months to deploy and also require significant regulatory and environmental approvals prior to installation.
About GigaBeam Corporation
GigaBeam is a provider of high-performance wireless point-to-point communications transport and access solutions that operate in the licensed 71-76 GHz and 81-86 GHz radio spectrum bands. GigaBeam equipment operates at multi-gigabit-per-second speeds. GigaBeam Corporation headquarters is located at 470 Springpark Place, Suite 900, Herndon, VA 20170. For more information, visit www.gigabeam.com. |
