QDOG - PSU must not have asked you about this one. TDMA no less.
News Alert from PR Newswire via Quote.com
Topic: Northern Telecom Ltd
Quote.com News Item #4368815
Headline: Revolutionary Campus Digital Wireless Network At Penn State Uses
IS-136 TDMA Equipment From Nortel (Northern Telecom)
======================================================================
UNIVERSITY PARK, Penn., Oct. 28 /PRNewswire/ - Penn State University will
soon benefit from an advanced private digital wireless network which promises
to revolutionize today's on-campus communications while providing insights
into tomorrow's personal communications.
This new network will use IS-136 TDMA digital equipment from Nortel
(Northern Telecom) and support from local CellularOne service provider
Vanguard Cellular to offer the latest wireless voice and data communications
capability.
It will also serve as a test bed for the Vanguard Alliance for the
Advancement of Wireless Technologies. Founded by Penn State and Vanguard
Cellular, the alliance promotes research into the emergence, acceptance and
development of wireless information technology.
''The Penn State campus network will feature some of the most advanced
digital wireless technology in the world,'' said Hermon Pon, assistant
vice-president and general manager, TDMA, Wireless Networks, Nortel.
''It will provide very high-quality voice, messaging and data transmission
services on-campus via digital wireless handsets,'' Pon said, ''and seamless
transition to off-campus communications using the same handsets.''
Already in place and awaiting initial trials, the Penn State network will
provide digital and analog wireless voice service for local users and campus
visitors. The digital voice service will make use of Nortel's Enhanced Full
Rate Codec (EFRC) technology to provide audio quality second to none anywhere
in the world.
The Penn State network will also provide Cellular Digital Packet Data
(CDPD) service for wireless data applications such as electronic mail and
Internet access.
Nortel's unique DualMode Radio cell sites support these voice and data
services dynamically -- on a call-by-call basis -- using digital signal
processor (DSP) based programmable radios which greatly simplify capacity
provisioning.
''We wanted to create a private wireless network that would be flexible
enough to meet the everyday demands of a very large and diverse campus
community,'' said Haynes G. Griffin, Chairman and Co-CEO of Vanguard Cellular.
''In the coming months and years,'' said Graham B. Spanier, president,
Penn State University, ''students and faculty may be seen increasingly around
campus with laptop computers that are tied to their e-mail and the Internet,
not by backbone and telephone connections, but through this new digital
wireless system.''
''Our faculty, staff and students will help the Alliance and Nortel
identify new ways of using these powerful new communications tools to better
lives, better business and better the world we live in,'' Spanier said.
Penn State is at the forefront of the development of Internet 2, a second,
faster network for linking higher education institutions and national
laboratories. In spring 1997, Penn State President Graham Spanier testified
before Congress on the need for funding for this work, the benefits of which
will be spread to K-12 schools, libraries and other institutions.
The Internet is a major component of campus life at all of Penn State's 24
locations, with a total of 100,000 electronic mail accounts and one million
electronic messages being transmitted daily, larger than many commercial
on-line services.
Penn State ranked second nationally among higher education institutions
for conducting $US 50.2 million in industry-sponsored research in fiscal 1995.
Based in Greensboro, N.C., Vanguard Cellular serves over half a million
customers in 29 different cellular markets. Vanguard is a publicly traded
company listed on the NASDAQ stock exchange under the symbol ''VCELA.''
Nortel works with customers worldwide to design, build, and integrate
digital networks -- for information, entertainment, education, and business --
offering one of the broadest choices of network solutions in the industry.
Nortel had 1996 revenues of $US 12.8 billion and has approximately 70,000
employees worldwide.
SOURCE Northern Telecom Limited
-0- 10/28/97
/CONTACT: Mark Buford, Nortel, 972-684-8512, mark.buford(at)nortel.com;
Todd Snyder, CellularOne, 717-579-4031; Bill Mahon, Penn State University,
814-865-7517; Frank McNally, Nortel, 703-712-8374,
frank.mcnally(at)nortel.com; Or visit Nortel's web-site at
nortel.com |
